Ifteafeirtgs 
 
 UC-NRLF 
 
 SPECIMENS 
 
 OF EXPOSITION 
 
GIFT OF 
 
 Professor G.R.Noyes 
 
SPECIMENS OF EXPOSITION 
 
 SELECTED AND EDITED 
 
 BY 
 
 HAMMOND LAMONT, A.B. 
 
 INSTRUCTOR IN ENGLISH tit HARVARD UNIVERSITY, 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 1896 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1894, 
 
 . l ,BY 
 
 Y KOLT & CO. 
 
 GIFT OF 
 ess<3-/ G ''K C 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 THIS book, though compiled primarily for college 
 classes in English Composition, should also be of use 
 in the most advanced classes of preparatory schools. 
 Both in school and in college the pupil ought to be 
 familiar, not only with those models of style which he 
 himself must analyze, but with those from which the 
 teacher draws illustrations for lectures and criticisms. 
 Such necessary familiarity is, as a matter of fact, im- 
 possible, unless the pupil own the book, or books, con- 
 taining thesje models ; but, unluckily for his pocket, no 
 one volume, indeed, no one writer, either appeals to 
 all interests or exhibits all excellences. These prac- 
 tical difficulties, in so far as they touch argumentative 
 writing, have been overcome in Professor George P. 
 Baker's " Specimens of Argumentation ; " and this 
 compilation attempts to overcome them for another 
 kind of writing exposition. By means of typical ex- 
 positions from such leading branches of study as 
 science, government, history, economics, philosophy, 
 theology, philology, and literature, the editor has tried 
 to reach different tastes and show methods of handling 
 different sorts of matter. 
 
 For valuable suggestions in the preparation of this 
 volume thanks are due Professor Barrett Wendell, of 
 Harvard University, Professor George Rice Carpenter, 
 
 884192 i 
 
ii PREFACE. 
 
 of Columbia College, and especially Mr. John Hays 
 Gardiner, of Harvard. 
 
 In reprinting these selections it has generally seemed 
 best to take no liberties with the original texts. Hence 
 the punctuation is not perfectly uniform throughout 
 the book. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE, MASS., July 27, 1895. 
 
TABLE OF CONTENTS. 
 
 PACK 
 
 Preface i 
 
 Introduction v 
 
 Development of a Plan I 
 
 V The Steam-Engine George C. V. Holmes. 9 
 
 /The Physical Basis of Life Thomas Henry Huxley. 22 
 
 v The Character and Policy of Charles II. John Richard Green. 40 
 
 The Interpretation of the Constitution .James Bryce. 46 
 
 The Graeco-Italian Stock Christian Matthias Theodor 
 
 Mommsen 73 
 
 The American Love of Freedom Edmund Burke. 95 
 
 The Division of Labor Adam Smith. 104 
 
 The Doctrines of Spinoza .Josiah Royce. 117 
 
 Peace : What it is .John Frederick Denison Maurice. 133 
 
 The Real Problem of the Unemployed " The Nation ". 144 
 
 Albery's " Apple Blossoms " William Archer. 148 
 
 V Wordsworth Matthew Arnold. 154 
 
 iii 
 
INTRODUCTION, 
 i. 
 
 WHAT EXPOSITION IS. 
 
 IN this compilation the editor has followed those 
 who divide writing roughly into four kinds, exposition, 
 argumentation, description, and narration. A glance 
 at these specimens shows that he has taken the term 
 exposition broadly enough to include all writing, the 
 chief purpose of which is to explain. For instance, 
 the first selection is an exposition, or explanation, of 
 the construction of the steam-engine ; the second is 
 Huxley's explanation of the nature of protoplasm ; the 
 third, Green's exposition of the character and policy 
 of Charles the Second ; the last, Arnold's exposition 
 of the place and value of Wordsworth's poetry. The 
 student, then, adopting this somewhat loose definition, 
 might, when asked for an exposition, expound, or ex- 
 plain, some mechanical or chemical process, such as the 
 operation of a dynamo or the reaction by which oxygen 
 and hydrogen are produced from water ; he might ex- 
 pound some theory or doctrine in religion, science, 
 philosophy, economics, or literature, such as the doc- 
 trine of the atonement, the theory of evolution, Kant's 
 idealism, Mill's theory of rent, or an opinion of Ten- 
 
vi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 nyson's " Idylls of the King ; " he might expound the 
 rules for baseball, the uses of the Greek optative mood, 
 the policy of Charlemagne, the working of the feudal 
 system, the powers of the English cabinet, or the 
 Democratic attitude on the tariff ; or he might, by 
 expounding the purport of an essay or book, make a 
 sort of exposition usually called a summary, or synop- 
 sis. 
 
 If, however, the student wishes, for the practice, to 
 stick rigidly to exposition, he will need a definition 
 somewhat sharper than that above. The common dis- 
 tinction, then, between exposition and argumentation is 
 that exposition is intended to explain, to make men 
 understand ; but argumentation, not merely to make 
 them understand, but to convince them that a certain 
 belief is sound, a certain course of action desirable. 
 This distinction is easy enough to apply in some cases 
 but hard in others. A man may, for instance, try 
 merely to explain the principles of free trade ; obvi- 
 ously he will be expounding. If, on the other hand, he 
 tries, not only to make his readers comprehend these 
 principles, but, more than that, to convince them that 
 free trade is beneficial, he will evidently be arguing. 
 And yet, what purports to be simply an exposition of 
 the principles of free trade, may readily have the prac- 
 tical effect of an argument for it. To decide whether 
 such a piece is argumentation or exposition is next to 
 impossible. Thus it happens that, although in most 
 cases the distinction is clear, yet exposition sometimes 
 shades so imperceptibly into argumentation, that no 
 man can draw a hard and fast line between them. 
 
IN TROD UC TIOM v jj 
 
 Sometimes also the usual distinction between expo- 
 sition and description, that exposition deals with the 
 subject in general, with a class, but description with 
 an individual, is hard to apply. The difficulty is, 
 moreover, increased by the confusion between the 
 rather technical use of description in books on rhetoric 
 and the common use, which frequently makes the word 
 do duty for exposition and narration. Strictly speak- 
 ing, an article on the horse in general would indubi- 
 tably be exposition, and an article on the appearance 
 and characteristics of some one horse, Sunol, for in- 
 stance, would as indubitably be description. This dis- 
 tinction is excellently illustrated by Professor John F. 
 Genung in his " Practical Elements of Rhetoric." ' 
 Fr<5m an encyclopedia article on the oak he quotes an 
 expository passage beginning as follows : 
 
 " Most of the trees belonging to the oak family are remarkable 
 for their thick and rugged bark and for the great abundance of 
 tannin which it contains. They have large and strong roots, 
 penetrating very deeply or extending very far horizontally. The 
 trunks are distinguished for their massiveness, and for the weight, 
 strength, and in most cases, the durability of their wood. Their 
 branches are strong and irregular, and form a broad head. The 
 buds are fitted for a climate with severe winters, the plaited or 
 folded leaves being covered by imbricate external scales, and 
 often still further protected by a separate downy scale surround- 
 ing each separate leaf. The leaves are plane and alternate, and 
 usually supported by a footstalk, at the base of which are two 
 slender scales or stipules, which for the most part fall off as the 
 leaf expands." 
 
 In contrast is the description of an individual oak 
 from Tennyson's " Merlin and Vivien : " 
 
 1 Page 385. 
 
Viii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 " A storm was coming, but the woods were still, 
 And in the wild wood of Broceliande, 
 Before an oak, so hollow, huge, and old 
 It look'd a tower of ruin'd mason-work, 
 At Merlin's feet the wily Vivien lay." 
 
 In these examples the distinction is clear enough, 
 because the individuals vary so widely, that each may 
 have features or traits not common to all of the class; 
 nevertheless we are perplexed, when the individuals 
 are so nearly alike, that a description of one serves as 
 an exposition of the class. A description of an indi- 
 vidual red squirrel, for instance, and an exposition 
 treating of red squirrels in general might be so written, 
 that to tell surely which was which would puzzle the 
 sharpest hair-splitter. 
 
 The distinction between exposition and narration 
 is much like that between exposition and description : 
 exposition deals with a class of events ; narration, 
 with individual events. You would, for example, use 
 exposition in telling the general process by which 
 bills pass Congress ; narration, in telling the course of 
 the so-called Wilson Tariff Bill. Here again the dis- 
 tinction, though usually clear, now and then becomes 
 imperceptible. 
 
 Yet, even if the student were able always to dis- 
 criminate, and if, for the practice, he wished to stick 
 wholly to exposition, he could scarcely succeed. In ex- 
 pounding his opinion of George Eliot's novels, he might 
 like to strengthen it here and there by a little argu- 
 mentation ; in expounding the construction of the 
 bicycle, he might, for illustration, describe - c ^me one 
 
IK TROD UCTION. 
 
 IX 
 
 machine ; in expounding the policy of Charlemagne, 
 he might, for clearness, be compelled to narrate some 
 of Charlemagne's deeds. Such deviations are* not, 
 however, blunders ; quite the contrary. The student 
 does enough, if he makes the exposition predominate. 
 Indeed, in most books and essays, the mixture of the 
 kinds of writing is so common, that it has inevitably 
 crept even into this volume, compiled expressly to 
 illustrate expository style. Arnold's essay on Words- 
 worth, though in the main expository, contains argu- 
 mentative passages, such as that running from page 
 1 66 into 171, where Arnold maintains Wordsworth's 
 superiority. The exposition of the steam-engine, pages 
 9-21, includes what may be called a description sub- 
 ordinated to the purpose of expounding steam-engines 
 in general. Green's exposition of the character of 
 Charles contains, page 41, a description of the king's 
 person. Finally, Adam Smith, to show how the division 
 of labor leads to the invention of machinery, relates, 
 page 113, the narrative of the invention of the sliding- 
 valve. We may conclude, then, that unadulterated ex- 
 position is seldom found in any work of considerable 
 length. We give the name, however, to that writing 
 in which the passages of argumentation, description, 
 and narration are subordinated to exposition. 
 
 II. 
 
 STICKING TO THE POINT. 
 
 IN spite of the admixture of other kinds of writing, 
 these selections illustrate the principles which anyrhet- 
 
X INTRO D UC TIOM 
 
 oric lays down as tending to the chief excellence of 
 exposition clearness. For observing these principles, 
 such as unity of purpose, logical division and arrange- 
 ment of material, and the illustration of general state- 
 ments by specific examples, there are no cut-and-dried 
 rules. The most a man can do is to get a clear un- 
 derstanding of the nature of the difficulties, study the 
 possible methods of solution, and for the result trust 
 to care and tact. 
 
 Take the first of these cardinal virtues, unity neglect 
 of it, the introduction of irrelevant facts, is a common 
 cause of obscurity in exposition. Yet there is no sub- 
 stitute for intelligence, no formula, which will enable a 
 man invariably to put in everything which belongs 
 in and leave out everything which belongs out. Of 
 course with any subject the student can go a certain 
 distance without hesitation : some matter he must on 
 no account omit ; some he must on no account admit. 
 To explain the game of tennis clearly, he must cer- 
 tainly tell about the court and he must as certainly 
 not wander off to the subject of golf links. But be- 
 tween these extremes lies the debatable ground, matter 
 more or less closely connected with the subject. How 
 much of it shall go in depends upon the exhaustiveness 
 of the treatment. For example, a short exposition of 
 the game of tennis could give little or no space to the 
 various strokes ; yet a book would have room for them. 
 In such cases the only way to decide is to consider 
 each point in relation to the scale on which the whole 
 is planned. 
 
 In these decisions the judgment may be greatly 
 
INI^ROD UC TION. x i 
 
 helped, if the student will begin composition by an 
 effort to put the gist of the whole exposition into a 
 single sentence, and will then keep that sentence in 
 mind. The experiment, though not always successful, 
 is worth trying, because it forces the student to do what 
 he might otherwise fail to do, consider seriously the 
 limits of the subject and the significance of the parts. 
 When he endeavors to put into a single sentence the 
 essence of a composition, say of five hundred or a 
 thousand words, he is likely to discover that some 
 things which he thought pertinent are after all unes- 
 sential ; and that others which he regarded as of little 
 moment are really vital. This knowledge makes it 
 comparatively easy to secure unity. 
 
 Such a " key-sentence " if the compound may 
 be allowed will often, of course, be a definition, but 
 not necessarily from a dictionary. The " key " for 
 an exposition of baseball might, for instance, be 
 some such definition as this : Baseball is a field game, 
 played with bat and ball, by eighteen men, nine on a 
 side. The first article in this volume has as its "key- 
 sentence" a definition which appears on page 10, lines 
 23-25 : 
 
 " A steam-engine may be defined as an apparatus for doing 
 work by means of heat applied to water." 
 
 Sometimes the " key " may indicate the plan or purport 
 of the exposition, as does the following sentence, page 
 24, lines 25-30, which outlines the whole of the selec- 
 tion from Huxley : 
 
 " I propose to demonstrate to you that, notwithstanding these 
 
x ii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 apparent difficulties, a threefold unity namely, a unity of power 
 or faculty, a unity of form, and a unity of substantial composition 
 does pervade the whole living world. 
 
 As in these two examples, a writer can frequently 
 use the " key-sentence " in the body of the exposition 
 itself. At times it may make a fitting conclusion, as 
 in Arnold's essay on Wordsworth, page 180, lines 2 1-24 : 
 
 "They (Wordsworth's poems) will co-operate with the benign 
 tendencies in human nature and society, and will, in their degree, 
 be efficacious in making men wiser, better, and happier." 
 
 Often, however, the sentence supplies an excellence 
 rare in undergraduate themes, a direct introduction. 
 A good example is furnished in the extract from 
 Mommsen, page 73, lines 1-4 : 
 
 " During the period when the Indo-Germanic nations, which 
 are now separated, still formed one stock, speaking the same lan- 
 guage, they attained a certain stage of culture, and they had a 
 vocabulary corresponding to it." 
 
 Another example is the beginning of the chapter from 
 Adam Smith, page 104, lines 1-5 : 
 
 " The greatest improvement in the productive powers of labor, 
 and the greater skill, dexterity, and judgment with which it is 
 anywhere "directed or applied, seem to have been the effects of 
 the division of labor." 
 
 But whether the " key-sentence " is a definition or 
 not ; whether it is used as an introduction or conclu- 
 sion, or is not used at all in the exposition itself ; the 
 fact remains that the student who writes one and then 
 bears it in mind, will be much more likely to stick to 
 the point. 
 
INTRODUCTION. x iii 
 
 III. 
 
 DIVISION OF MATERIAL. 
 
 SINCE the mind grasps a subject more surely, if but 
 one phase is presented at a time, the material for an 
 exposition should be divided into groups, each treating 
 of but one phase. This general admonition will be 
 rendered more definite by an examination of the accom- 
 panying selections. 
 
 In the first, pages 10 and n set forth the theory 
 upon which the steam-engine is based ; pages 12 and 
 13 furnish a brief preliminary statement of the way in 
 which the simple cylinder and piston are modified in 
 practice. Then follow the details, which are lucid be- 
 cause the writer has divided them into two groups. 
 Into the first, pages 13-15, he has put everything 
 about the apparatus for generating steam ; and into the 
 second, pages 16-21, everything about the manage- 
 ment of the steam afterward. Furthermore, the first 
 group is subdivided into smaller groups : the boiler, 
 page 13, lines 24-32 ; the furnace, page 14, lines 1-13, 
 and page 15, lines 1-17; and the steam-pipe and 
 safety-valve, page 15, lines 21-29. In like manner the 
 second large group is subdivided : the cylinder, page 
 17, lines 4-8; the piston, lines 8-10 ; the connections 
 with the fly-wheel, lines 10-22, and all of page 19 ; and 
 the valve-box, pages 20 and 21. 
 
 The same careful division is to be found in the other 
 
xiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 selections. Perhaps the best example of all is the bit 
 from Burke's Speech on Conciliation with America, 
 pages 95-103. After the introductory paragraph Burke 
 separates his matter into six parts : the descent of the 
 Americans, their form of government, religion, man- 
 ners, education, and remoteness from the seat of English 
 government. To each of these he devotes a paragraph. 
 In the first he says all he has to say on descent ; and 
 so on : there is no confusion, no slipping into a later 
 paragraph matter belonging in an earlier. Every point 
 is distinct. 
 
 In order to make such clear divisions in his own 
 material, the student should understand drawing plans. 
 To this end a study of the pages immediately following 
 this introduction is profitable. Here Arnold's essay 
 on Wordsworth is outlined, at first briefly, and then 
 more fully. In the first plan, pages i and 2, the six 
 leading parts of the essay appear, marked with the 
 large Roman numerals, I, II, III, etc. ; in the second 
 plan, pages 2 and 3, the more important of the subor- 
 dinate ideas, marked with capitals, A, B, C, etc., are 
 grouped under the leading heads ; in the third, pages 
 3-5, less important ideas, marked a, b, c, etc., are 
 added ; and so on, until in the fourth plan, pages 5-8, 
 the outline is fairly complete. In each case the sub- 
 ordinate ideas are carefully classified under the main 
 points to which they most closely relate. For example, 
 in all the plans the heading V marks the ideas regard- 
 ing Wordsworth's superior power. In plan II, page 3, 
 lines 3-6, two subordinate ideas bearing on this same 
 matter appear as follows : 
 
INTRODUCTION. xv 
 
 " V. His superior power is found in 
 
 A. His noble and profound application of ideas to life; 
 
 B. His unique and unmatchable style." 
 
 In plan III, page 4, lines 16-32, and page 5, lines 1-3, 
 seven minor points are added : " Poetry is at bottom a 
 criticism of life from the point of view of morals ; " 
 " A poetry of revolt against moral ideas is a poetry of 
 revolt against life;" "Though other poets revolt 
 against moral ideas, or are content with subordinate 
 things, Wordsworth criticises life according to moral 
 ideas ; " " His style is often ponderous and pompous ; " 
 " Yet it often has the subtle turn and heightening of 
 the best poets ; " " It has also a noble plainness, like 
 that of Burns ; " " In spite of these suggestions of the 
 style of other poets, Wordsworth's style is, nevertheless, 
 unique and unmatchable." The first three of these 
 obviously explain A, " His noble and profound appli- 
 cation of ideas to life ; " the four last relate more closely 
 to his style, and therefore are grouped under B. The 
 arrangement of the seven points is, then, as follows : 
 " V. His superior power is found in 
 
 A. His noble and profound application of ideas to life. For 
 
 a. Poetry is at bottom a criticism of life from the point 
 
 of view of morals ; 
 
 b. A poetry of revolt against moral ideas is a poetry of 
 
 revolt against life ; 
 
 c. Though other poets revolt against moral ideas, or 
 
 are content with subordinate things, Wordsworth 
 criticises life according to moral ideas. 
 
 B. His style, which is 
 
 a. Often ponderous and pompous, 
 
 b. Yet often has the subtle turn and heightening of 
 
 the best poets ; 
 
 c. It has also a noble plainness, like that of Burns, 
 
xvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 d. In spite of these suggestions of the style of other 
 poets, Wordsworth's style is, nevertheless, unique 
 and unmatchable." 
 
 The student will find it excellent practice to draw 
 similar plans of some of the other selections, particu- 
 larly "The Steam- Engine," page 9; "The Physical 
 Basis of Life," 22 ; " The Interpretation of the Consti- 
 tution," 46 ; " The American Love of Freedom," 95 ; 
 and " The Division of Labor," 104. 
 
 When once he has mastered the principle upon which 
 a plan is drawn, he will be able to lay out his own work 
 intelligently. Of mechanical devices to assist in this 
 division of material, none is better than that suggested 
 by Professor Barrett Wendell in his " English Compo- 
 sition," l to put each main heading on a separate sheet 
 of paper or card. This done, the subordinate head- 
 ings can be jotted down on their proper cards, till the 
 plan is finished. An exposition of the game of base- 
 ball might, for instance, be planned with the three 
 following main headings upon separate cards : 
 I. The accessories of the game. 
 II. The positions of the players. 
 
 III. The process of play. 
 
 The first card could be filled out thus, with points re- 
 lating wholly to the accessories of the game : 
 
 I. The accessories of the game. 
 
 A. The field. 
 
 B. The bat. 
 
 C. The ball. 
 
 This outline could be still further developed, in the 
 following way : 
 
 165. 
 
INTRODUCTION. XVii 
 
 I. The accessories of the game. 
 
 A. The field. 
 
 a. Shape. 
 
 b. Dimensions. 
 
 c. Fixtures. 
 
 1. Bases. 
 
 2. Baselines. 
 
 3. Pitcher's box. 
 
 4. Batter's box. 
 
 5. Back-stop. 
 
 B. The bat. 
 
 a. Shape. 
 
 b. Size. 
 
 c. Weight. 
 
 d. Material. 
 
 C. The ball. 
 
 a. Shape. 
 
 b. Size. 
 
 c. Weight. 
 
 d. Material. 
 
 Then the headings on the other two cards could be 
 similarly treated. 
 
 By this study of the plans of the various selections 
 and by work on his own plans the student will soon 
 learn that each exposition offers a problem of which 
 there are likely to be several solutions ; and that the 
 clearest of them may be reached by adherence to no 
 minute rules, but to the broad principle that matters 
 closely related should be kept together. 1 
 
 1 Wendell's " English Composition," page 135. 
 2 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 IV. 
 
 GROUPING OF DIVISIONS. 
 
 SOMETIMES the very process of division makes it 
 evident at once that there is but one order for the 
 groups. For example, when the author of " The Steam- 
 Engine " separated his material into four parts, the 
 theory, the general application of that theory in prac- 
 tice, the details relating to the production of steam, and 
 those relating to the use of it, he could not for a 
 moment doubt that clearness demanded the arrange- 
 ment of groups in the order named. Likewise when 
 Burke traced the American love of freedom to six 
 sources, descent, form of government, religion, man- 
 ners, education, and remoteness, he naturally con- 
 sidered first the first of these causes, descent. 
 
 But if the division does not obviously settle the 
 order, the writer must further exercise his ingenuity in 
 studying it out. In this task he must remember that 
 since in exposition the chief aim is clearness, he should 
 proceed from the simple to the complex. Thus Green, 
 pages 40-45, considers first the .character of Charles > 
 then the policy, an understanding of which involves a 
 knowledge of the character. Bryce, in his chapter on 
 the interpretation of the Constitution, pages 46-72, 
 has three headings : the authorities entitled to interpret; 
 the principles followed ; and the checks on abuses of 
 the interpreting power. Though this arrangement does 
 not at once seem inevitable, a little examination proves 
 
INTRODUCTION. xi x 
 
 that the checks cannot be understood, until the author- 
 ities and principles are known. This principle of pro- 
 ceeding from the simple to the complex determines the 
 order of the three divisions of an exposition of base- 
 ball, given in section III : for the positions of the 
 players cannot be made clear, until the reader knows 
 something about at least one accessory of the game, 
 the field ; and the process of play cannot be under- 
 stood, until the accessories and the positions of the 
 piayers are explained. 
 
 If clearness may be secured equally well in two or 
 three different ways, then that should be adopted 
 which, by bringing the most important group at 
 the end, gives force. Thus Huxley, in his ex- 
 position of the nature of protoplasm, pages 22-39, 
 speaks first of power, then of form, and last of 
 composition, because the substance is of more con- 
 sequence than power or form. Burke, in considering 
 the causes of the American love of freedom, pages 95- 
 103, discusses last the remoteness of America, because 
 " no contrivance can prevent the effect of " this cause. 
 Adam Smith, in treating the results of the division of 
 labor,^ increase in dexterity, the saving of time, and 
 the invention of machinery, puts the invention of 
 machinery last, because that, more than anything else, 
 has " facilitated and abridged " labor. 
 
 In arranging the groups the device of the separate 
 cards will be of much value ; for the cards can be 
 shifted, until the writer has done his best to secure both 
 clearness and force. 
 
XX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 V. 
 
 ILLUSTRATION BY EXAMPLES. 
 
 NECESSARY equally to clearness and force is the illus< 
 tration of general statements by particular examples ; 
 for' abstractions produce little or no effect, till trans* 
 lated into concrete terms. If the writer himself does 
 not translate, the reader must; and this task makes 
 hard reading of passages like the following : ' 
 
 "The Imagination I consider either as primary, or secondary. 
 The primary Imagination I hold to be the living power and prime 
 agent of all human perception, and as a repetition in the finite 
 mind of the eternal act of creation in the infinite I AM. The 
 secondary Imagination I consider as an echo of the former, co- 
 existing with the conscious will, yet still as identical with the 
 primary in the kind of its agency, and differing only in degree, 
 and in the mode of its operation. It dissolves, diffuses, dissi- 
 pates, in order to re-create ; or where this process is rendered im- 
 possible, yet still at all events it struggles to idealize and to 
 unify. It is essentially vital, even as all objects (as objects) are 
 essentially fixed and dead. 
 
 " FANCY, on the contrary, has no other counters to play with 
 but fixities and defihites. The fancy is indeed no other than a 
 mode of memory emancipated from the order of time and space ; 
 while it is blended with, and modified by, that empirical phenom- 
 enon of the will, which we express by the word Choice. But 
 equally with the ordinary memory the fancy must receive all its 
 materials ready made from the law of association." 
 
 Contrast with this the advantage of the examples in 
 Professor Royce's treatment of a subject equally ab- 
 struse, pages 122124 : 
 
 1 Coleridge, " Biographia Literaria," end of Chapter XIII. 
 
INTRODUCTION. Xxi 
 
 "Technicalities aside, this doctrine is essentially founded upon 
 what Spinoza regards as the axiom that everything in the world 
 must be either explained by its own nature, or by some higher 
 nature. You explain a thing when you comprehend why it must 
 be what it is. Thus, for instance, in geometry, you know that all 
 the diameters of any one circle must be precisely equal, and you 
 know that this is so, because you see why it must be so. The 
 diameters are drawn in the circle and through the centre of it, 
 and the circle has a certain nature, a structure, a make, a build, 
 whereby, for instance, you distinguish it from an oval or a square. 
 This bund, this make of the circle, it is that forces the diameters 
 to be equal. They can't help being equal, being drawn through 
 the centre of a curve which has no elongation, no bulge outwards 
 in one direction more than another, but which is evenly curved 
 all around. The nature of the circle, then, at once forces the 
 diameters to be equal, pins them down to equality, hems in any 
 rebellious diameter that should try to stretch out farther than 
 the others, and also explains to the reason of a geometer just 
 why this result follows. My example is extremely dry and sim- 
 ple, but it will serve to show what Spinoza is thinking of. He 
 says now, as something self-evident, that anything in the world 
 which doesn't directly contain its own explanation must be a part 
 of some larger nature of things which does explain it, and which, 
 accordingly, forces it to be just what it is. For instance, to use 
 my own illustration, if two mountains had precisely the same 
 height, as the diameters of a circle have precisely the same 
 length, we should surely have to suppose something in the nature 
 of the physical universe which forced just these two mountains 
 to have the same height. But, even so, as things actually are, we 
 must suppose that whatever is or happens, in case it is not a self- 
 evident and necessary thing, must have its explanation in some 
 higher and larger nature of things. Thus, once more, you your- 
 self are either what you are by virtue of your own self-evident 
 and self-made nature, or else, as is the view of Spinoza, you are 
 forced to be what you are by the causes that have produced you, 
 and that have brought you here." 
 
 The fact that most people grasp general statements 
 
Xxii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 either slightly or not at all is well understood by good 
 speakers and writers. Their works, accordingly, 
 abound in such concrete instances as appear in the 
 five following passages, chosen from many in this 
 volume : 
 
 " What, truly, can seem more obviously different from one 
 another, in faculty, in form, and in substance, than the various 
 kinds of living beings ? What community of faculty can there 
 be between the brightly -colored lichen, which so nearly resembles 
 a mere mineral incrustation of the bare rock on which it grows, 
 and the painter, to whom it is instinct with beauty, or the bot- 
 anist, whom it feeds with knowledge ? " Huxley, page 23, lines 
 12-19. 
 
 " He held his own fairly with the wits of his Court, and bandied 
 repartees on equal terms with Sedley or Buckingham. Even 
 Rochester in his merciless epigram was forced to own that 
 ' Charles never said a foolish thing.' He had inherited in fact 
 his grandfather's gift of pithy sayings, and his habitual irony 
 often gave an amusing turn to them. When his brother, the 
 most unpopular man in England, solemnly warned him of plots 
 against his life, Charles laughingly bade him set all fear aside. 
 ' They will never kill me, James,' he said, ' to make you king.' " 
 Green, page 42, lines 30-32, page 43, lines 1-9. 
 
 " Who are you, that you should fret and rage, and bite the 
 chains of Nature ? nothing worse happens to you than does to 
 all nations who have extensive empire; and it happens in all the 
 forms into which empire can be thrown. In large bodies, the 
 circulation of power must be less vigorous at the extremities. 
 Nature has said it. The Turk cannot govern Egypt, and Arabia, 
 and Kurdistan, as he governs Thrace ; nor has he the same 
 dominion in Crimea and Algiers which he has at Brusa and 
 Smyrna." Burke, page 102, lines 6-15. 
 
 " Even the elements of science and religion show traces of a 
 community of origin. The numbers aro the same up to one 
 
INTRODUCTION. xxiii 
 
 hundred (Sanscrit fatam eka$atam, Latin centum, Greek -/cardy, 
 Gothic hund} ; and the moon receives her name in all languages 
 from the fact that men measure time by her (mensis)" Mommsen, 
 page 77, lines 11-16. 
 
 " The question, how to live, is itself a moral idea; and it is the 
 question which most interests every man, and with which, in 
 some way or other, he is perpetually occupied. A large sense is 
 of course to be given to the term moral. Whatever bears upon 
 the question, ' how to live,' comes under it. 
 
 ' Nor love thy life, nor hate; but, what thou liv'st, 
 Live well ; how long or short, permit to heaven.' 
 In those fine lines Milton utters, as every one at once per- 
 ceives, a moral idea. Yes, but so too, when Keats consoles the 
 forward-bending lover on the Grecian Urn, the lover arrested and 
 presented in immortal relief by the sculptor's hand before he can 
 kiss, with the line, 
 
 ' Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair, ' 
 he utters a moral idea. When Shakespeare says, that 
 
 ' We are such stuff 
 
 As dreams are made of, and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep,' 
 he utters a moral idea." Arnold, page 167, lines 8-20. 
 
 Although supplying apt examples is often a hard 
 job, the toil is well spent. Without them a writer 
 surely invites the censure passed long ago by Sir 
 Philip Sidney, "his knowledge standeth so much upon 
 the abstract and general, that happy is that man who 
 may understand him." With them, on the other hand, 
 the writer may perhaps win the praise Sidney accorded 
 the " peerless poet/' " he coupleth the general notion 
 with the particular example." 
 
xxiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 VI. 
 
 SUMMARY. 
 
 IN brief, then, the term exposition in this volume 
 has been taken broadly to include all writing, the main 
 purpose of which is to explain. Exposition differs 
 from argumentation in that it merely explains, rather 
 than convinces or persuades ; from description and 
 narration, in that it deals with a class rather than with 
 an individual. For an adequate exposition the first 
 requisite is clearness ; the second, force. To secure 
 these qualities the most important principles to be ob- 
 served are unity, logical division and arrangement of 
 material, and the illustration of general statements by 
 specific examples. 
 
SPECIMENS OF EXPOSITION. 
 
 Development of a plan* 
 
 Below are four plans of Matthew Arnold's essay on 
 Wordsworth, the last in this volume. These plans, 
 which differ only in elaboration, show how a simple 
 outline may be gradually filled in till it becomes a fairly 
 
 5 complete synopsis of the original essay. As a syn- 
 opsis, however, it is unsatisfactory, because it lacks 
 literary form. The main points, which are given large 
 Roman numerals, appear in the first plan. The sub- 
 ordinate ideas, which are marked by letters large and 
 
 to small and by Arabic numerals, are added one after 
 another in the succeeding plans. Of course, plans of 
 some of the shorter selections are necessarily less 
 elaborate. 
 
 I. 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 BY MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 I. Wordsworth is unpopular. 
 
 15 II. Notwithstanding his unpopularity, he is one of the 
 greatest poets. 
 
 I 
 
2 THE DEVELOPMENT OF A PLAN. 
 
 III. This greacaess most readers fail to perceive. 
 
 IV. Well arranged selections irom his works would, 
 
 howevet, show his superiority. 
 
 V. His superior power is found in his noble and pro- 
 found application of ideas to life and in his 5 
 unique and unmatchable style. 
 VI. Summary. 
 
 II. 
 WORDSWORTH, 
 
 BY MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 I. Wordsworth is unpopular. 
 
 A. At home he is not read ; 
 
 B. On the Continent he is unknown. 10 
 II. Notwithstanding his unpopularity, he is, 
 
 A. After Shakespeare and Milton, the greatest 
 
 English poet ; 
 
 B. Except Goethe, the greatest European poet 
 
 since Moliere. 15 
 
 III. This greatness most readers fail to perceive, be- 
 
 cause : 
 
 A. His poems of greatest bulk are by no means 
 
 his best ; 
 
 B. His good pieces are mingled with a mass of 20 
 
 inferior ones, which destroy the effect ; 
 
 C. He has classified his poems in an unsatisfac- 
 
 tory fashion. 
 
 IV. Well arranged selections would show him, 
 
 A. Not by comparison of single pieces, superior 25 
 to the best of the later English or Conti- 
 nental poets ; 
 
WORDSWORTH. $ 
 
 B. But superior to them in ampler body of power- 
 
 ful work. 
 V. His superior power is found in 
 
 A. His noble and profound application of ideas to 
 5 life; 
 
 R His unique and unmatchable style. 
 VI. Summary. 
 
 III. 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 BY MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 I. Wordsworth is unpopular. 
 
 A. At home, 
 
 10 a. In his lifetime he was but little read ; 
 
 b. Since his death his fame has scarcely grown ; 
 
 B. The Continent, which has 
 
 a. Recognized the glory of Newton and Darwin, 
 
 b. Does not know Wordsworth ; 
 
 15 c. Yet the Continental critics long failed to do 
 
 justice to Shakespeare and Milton. 
 II. Notwithstanding Wordsworth's unpopularity, he is, 
 
 A. After Shakespeare and Milton, the greatest 
 
 English poet. For, in power, in interest, in 
 20 the qualities which give enduring freshness, 
 
 he is superior to all the others ; 
 
 B. Except Goethe, the greatest European poet 
 
 since Moliere. For, in real poetic achieve- 
 ment, he ranks above the leading poets of 
 25 a. Germany, 
 
 b. Italy, 
 
 c. France. 
 
4 THE DEVELOPMENT OF A PLAN. 
 
 III. This greatness most readers fail to perceive, be- 
 
 cause : 
 
 A. His poems of greatest bulk are by no means 
 
 his best ; 
 
 B. His good pieces are mingled with a mass of 5 
 
 inferior ones, which destroy the effect ; 
 
 C. He has classified his poems in an unsatisfac- 
 
 tory fashion. 
 
 IV. Well arranged selections would show him, 
 
 A. Not by comparison of single pieces, superior 10 
 
 to the best of the later 
 
 a. English poets, 
 
 b. Or Continental poets ; 
 
 B. But superior to them in ampler body of power- 
 
 ful work. 15 
 
 V. His superior power is found in 
 
 A. His noble and profound application of ideas to 
 
 life. For, 
 
 a. Poetry is at bottom a criticism of life from 
 
 the point of view of morals ; 20 
 
 b. A poetry of revolt against moral ideas is a 
 
 poetry of revolt against life ; 
 
 c. Though other poets revolt against moral 
 
 ideas, or are content with subordinate 
 things, Wordsworth criticises life accord- 25 
 ing to moral ideas. 
 
 B. His style, which is 
 
 a. Often ponderous and pompous, 
 
 b. Yet often has the subtle turn and heighten- 
 
 ing of the best poets ; 30 
 
 c. It has also a noble plainness, like that of 
 
 Burns. 
 
WORDSWORTH. 5 
 
 d. In spite of these suggestions of the style of 
 other poets, Wordsworth's style is, never- 
 theless, unique and unmatchable. 
 VI. Summary. 
 
 IV. 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 BY MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 $ I. Wordsworth is unpopular. 
 
 A. At home, 
 
 a. In his lifetime, 
 
 1. His poetry sold poorly ; 
 
 2. The public was slow to recognize him ; 
 10 3. He was effaced by Scott and Byron; 
 
 4. He was overshadowed by Tennyson. 
 
 b. Since his death, 
 
 i. Coleridge's influence, which once told 
 
 strongly in his favor, has waned ; 
 
 15 2. In spite of Wordsworth's able eulogists, 
 
 the public has remained cold. 
 
 B. The Continent, which has 
 
 a. Recognized the glory of Newton and Darwin 
 
 b. Does not know Wordsworth ; 
 
 20 c. Yet Continental critics long failed to do 
 
 justice to Shakespeare and Milton. 
 
 II. Notwithstanding Wordsworth's unpopularity, he is, 
 
 A. After Shakespeare and Milton, the greatest 
 
 English poet. For in power, in interest, in 
 
 *5 the qualities which give enduring freshness, 
 
 he is superior to Spenser, Dryden, Pope, 
 
 Gray, Goldsmith, Cowper, Burns, Coleridge, 
 
6 THE DEVELOPMENT OF A PLAN. 
 
 Scott, Campbell, Moore, Byron, Shelley, and 
 Keats. 
 
 B. Except Goethe, the greatest European poet 
 since Moliere. For, in real poetic achieve- 
 ment, he ranks above the leading poets of ^ 
 
 a. Germany Klopstock, Lessing, Schiller, 
 
 Uhland, Riickert, and Heine ; 
 
 b. Italy Filicaia, Alfieri, Manzoni, and Leo- 
 
 pardi ; 
 
 c. France Racine, Boileau, Voltaire, Andre 10 
 
 Chenier, Beranger, Lamartine, Musset, 
 and M. Victor Hugo. 
 
 III. This greatness most readers fail to perceive, be- 
 
 cause : 
 
 A. His poems of greatest bulk are by no means 15 
 
 his best the " Excursion " and the " Pre- 
 lude " ; 
 
 B. His good pieces are mingled with a mass of 
 
 inferior ones, which destroy the effect ; 
 
 C. He classified his poems in an unsatisfactory 20 
 
 fashion poems of fancy, poems of imagina- 
 tion, poems of sentiment, poems of reflec- 
 tion, etc. 
 
 IV. Well arranged selections would show him, 
 
 A. Not by comparison of single pieces, superior 25 
 
 to the best of the later 
 
 a. English poets Gray, Burns, Coleridge, and 
 
 Keats ; 
 
 b. Or the Continental poets Manzoni and 
 
 Heine ; 30 
 
 B. But superior to all these in ampler body of 
 
 powerful work. 
 
WORDSWORTH. j 
 
 V. Wordsworth's superior power is found in, 
 
 A. His noble and profound application of ideas to 
 
 life. For 
 
 a. Poetry is at bottom a criticism of life from 
 5 the point of view of morals, even though 
 
 morals, the essential thing in life, 
 
 1. Are often treated in a narrow and false 
 
 fashion ; 
 
 2. Are bound up with systems of thought 
 10 and belief which have had their day ; 
 
 3. Have fallen into the hands of profes- 
 
 sional dealers and pedants ; 
 
 4. Have grown tiresome to some of us ; 
 
 5. And at times inspire revolt. 
 
 15 b. A poetry of revolt against moral ideas is a 
 
 poetry of revolt against life. For 
 
 1. The concern how to live a moral idea 
 
 is the chief and master thing ; 
 
 2. The play of the senses, literary form or 
 20 finish, or argumentative ingenuity, are 
 
 subordinate things. 
 
 c. Though other poets revolt against moral 
 ideas, or are content with these subordi- 
 nate things, Wordsworth criticises life ac- 
 25 cording to moral ideas ; he deals with 
 
 life, 
 
 1. Directly. In this respect he is above 
 
 those who have not this distinctive 
 accent of high and genuine poets, such 
 30 as Voltaire, Dryden, Pope, Lessing, 
 
 and Schiller. 
 
 2. As a whole. 
 
8 THE DEVELOPMENT OF A PLAN. 
 
 3. And more powerfully than others who 
 actually have the distinctive accent, . 
 such as Burns, Keats, and Heine. 
 Such dealing consists, 
 i. Not in uttering philosophic truths, as 5 
 
 in the " Excursion," 
 ii. Nor in setting forth a scientific system 
 
 of thought, 
 iii. But in feeling, 
 
 a. The joy offered to us in Nature ; 10 
 /3. The simple, primary affections and 
 duties which are universally ac- 
 cessible. 
 B. His style, which is, 
 
 a. Often ponderous and pompous, as in the 15 
 
 " Excursion,'* 
 
 b. Yet often has the subtle turn and heighten- 
 
 ing we find in Shakespeare and Milton. 
 
 c. It has also a noble plainness, like that of 
 
 Burns. 20 
 
 d. In spite of these suggestions of the style of 
 
 other poets, Wordsworth's style is unique 
 and unmatchable in two respects : 
 
 1. The profound sincerity with which he 
 
 feels his subject, as in " Resolution and 2 5 
 Independence" ; 
 
 2. The profoundly sincere and natural 
 
 character of the subject itself, as in 
 " Michael," " The Fountain," and 
 " The Highland Reaper." 3 
 
 VI. Summary. 
 
GEORGE C. V. HOLMES. 
 
 The following selection is based upon the first chapter of 
 George C. V. Holmes's " The Steam-Engine, " in the " Text- 
 Books of Science." London, 1888. The chapter has been 
 shortened by the omission of passages referring to subsequent 
 5 parts of the book and by minor changes in phrasing. 
 
 This explanation of the engine is an example of exposition 
 which for perfect clearness needs illustration by diagram. Such 
 illustration is a valuable supplement to most writing which deals 
 with mechanism or with natural objects at all complex in struct- 
 
 10 ure, like animal or vegetable forms. Another point worth noting 
 is the careful definition of technical terms, which makes the piece 
 generally intelligible, even though it is intended for those who 
 already know something of the subject. Of course writing tech- 
 nical treatises which can be understood only by those possessing 
 
 j 5 technical knowledge is perfectly legitimate, but the average stu- 
 dent will find better practice, so far as English Composition is con- 
 cerned, in the harder task of imparting his technical knowledge 
 to laymen. The student who does well in this more difficult 
 undertaking will be fairly sure of success in the easier. 
 
 20 A COMPLETE knowledge of the steam-engine involves 
 an acquaintance with the sciences of physics, of chemis- 
 try, and of pure and applied mathematics, as well as with 
 the theory of mechanism and the strength of materials. 
 My plan, however, is to begin by showing in a very 
 
 9 
 
10 
 
 THE STEAM-ENGINE. 
 
 simple case how steam can do work, and then to ex- 
 plain an actual engine of the most modern construction, 
 but at the same time remarkably free from complexity. 
 Take a hollow cylinder, figure i, the bottom closed 
 while the top remains open, and pour in water to the 5 
 height of a few inches. Next cover the water with a 
 flat plate, or piston, which fits the interior of the cyl- 
 inder perfectly ; then apply heat to the water, and we 
 shall witness the following phenomena. After the 
 
 lapse of some minutes the water 10 
 will begin to boil, and the steam 
 accumulating at the upper surface 
 will make room for itself by raising 
 the piston slightly. As the boiling 
 continues, more and more steam 15 
 will be formed, and raise the piston 
 higher and higher, till all the water 
 is boiled away, and nothing but 
 steam is left in the cylinder. Now 
 this machine, consisting of cylinder, 20 
 piston, water, and fire, is the steam- 
 engine in its most elementary form. 
 For a steam-engine may be defined 
 as an apparatus for doing work by 
 
 means of heat applied to water ; and since raising such 25 
 a weight as the piston is a form of doing work, this 
 apparatus, clumsy and inconvenient though it may be, 
 answers the definition precisely. 
 
 Furthermore, if instead of a simple piston we had 
 taken one loaded with weights, and had applied heat as 30 
 before, the result would have been similar, but not ex- 
 actly the same. The water would not have begun to boil 
 
GEORGE C. f. &OLMES. 1 1 
 
 so soon, and when it was all boiled away, the loaded 
 piston would not have risen to the same height as the 
 unloaded. Suppose next that, having raised the weight 
 as far as it would go, and having then removed it from 
 5 the piston, we wished to employ the apparatus to raise 
 another weight, we should then have to bring back the 
 steam to its condition of water. This we could do by 
 removing the fire and surrounding the cylinder with 
 cold water instead. As a result the steam, condensing 
 
 10 into water, would fall back to its original volume, the 
 piston would follow it, and everything would be ready 
 for a fresh start. We see then that this apparatus, 
 though a steam-engine, is nevertheless a very bad one, 
 for the following reasons : first, the only kind of work 
 
 1 5 it can do is raising weights through certain heights; 
 secondly, when we want to repeat the operation, we 
 have to go through the cumbrous process of removing 
 the fire, surrounding the cylinder with water, and then 
 replacing the fire ; thirdly, while condensing the steam 
 
 20 by this method, we make the cylinder cold, and waste a 
 large quantity of heat in warming it again ; and finally, 
 when at the cost of considerable fuel we have heated 
 the water and turned it into steam, we allow all the 
 heat of the steam to escape into the cold water, and 
 
 25 thus become wasted, though, if properly used, it is 
 capable of doing much more work. We conclude, there- 
 fore, that our elementary engine is limited in scope, 
 clumsy in use, and extremely wasteful of fuel. It is in 
 obviating these disadvantages that actual engines differ 
 
 30 from it. 
 
 This engine, as has been said, consists of four ele- 
 ments, namely : the fire, or source of heat ; the water, 
 
12 THE STEAM-ENGINE. 
 
 or medium to which the heat is applied, and which, 
 when turned into steam, does work; the piston and 
 cylinder to contain the water and steam, and to prevent 
 the latter from escaping into the air and becoming lost ; 
 and, lastly, the source of cold, or water by which the 5 
 steam is condensed and brought back to its original 
 condition. Most real engines consist of these four 
 elements, advantageously adjusted, and with the addi- 
 tion of mechanism for changing the straight line move- 
 ment of the piston into circular, or some other kind of 10 
 motion. 
 
 In practice the arrangement adopted is as follows : 
 
 1. The source of heat and the vessel containing the 
 water to be boiled, called respectively the furnace and 
 the boiler, are kept separate from the cylinder. A pipe, 15 
 called a steam-pipe, carries the steam from the boiler, 
 where it is generated, to the cylinder, where it is used. 
 
 2. The steam, after doing its work in the cylinder, is 
 not condensed by the pouring of cold water over the 
 cylinder, but the same general purpose of getting the 20 
 piston ready to repeat its movement is effected by tak- 
 ing the old steam out of the cylinder, and letting in a 
 new supply. The steam, thus taken out through a 
 second pipe, called an exhaust-pipe, is led, either into 
 the open air, where it escapes, or into the condenser, 25 
 a separate vessel wholly apart from the cylinder. 
 
 3. The cylinder, instead of being open at one end, 
 and of indefinite length, is closed at both ends, and in 
 length seldom exceeds twice the diameter of the piston. 
 
 4. The steam, instead of being used on but one side 30 
 of the piston, is admitted first to one side and then to 
 the other, and is also exhausted from the sides alter- 
 
GEORGE C. V. HOLMES. 13 
 
 nately, so that when the engine is in use, the piston is 
 constantly travelling backward and forward from one 
 end of the cylinder to the other. To allow the steam 
 thus alternately to enter and escape, suitable openings 
 Bare made at each end of the cylinder, and valves are 
 provided to insure the admission and escape of the 
 steam at the proper moments. 
 
 5. The piston, instead of being loaded with weights 
 to be lifted directly, is fitted with a cylindrical bar, or 
 
 10 rod, called the piston-rod, firmly attached to the centre 
 of the piston, and continued through the cylinder into 
 the open air, where it moves backward and forward in 
 a straight line, exactly as the piston does. By a me- 
 chanical contrivance, to be described hereafter, this 
 
 15 straight line motion of the end of the piston-rod is 
 changed into circular motion, so that the engine can be 
 used, not only for lifting weights, but for turning wheels 
 and doing any other work required. 
 
 The manner in which some of these purposes are 
 
 20 accomplished is shown by the accompanying diagram. 
 Figure 2 is an elevation of the boiler ; figure 3 a verti- 
 cal section through its axis ; and figure 4 a horizontal 
 section through the furnace bars. 
 
 The type of steam-generator here exhibited is known 
 
 25 as a vertical tubular boiler. The outside casing, or 
 shell, which is cylindrical in shape, is composed of 
 wrought iron, or steel plates, riveted together as shown 
 in figure 2. The top, which is also composed of the 
 same material, is slightly dome-shaped, except at the 
 
 30 centre, which is cut away to receive the chimney, a, a 
 cylinder of thin wrought iron p'ates. The interior, 
 which is shown in vertical section in figure 3, contains 
 
THE STEAM-ENGINE. 
 
 Fig. 2. 
 
 in the first place the furnace-chamber, b, which holds 
 the fire. This furnace, like the shell of the boiler, is 
 formed of wrought iron, or steel plates, in the shape of 
 a cylinder, the top of which is covered by a flat cir- 
 cular plate, cc, firmly attached to 5 
 the cylinder by flanging and rivet- 
 ing. The bottom is occupied by 
 the grating on which rests the in- 
 candescent fuel. This grating con- 
 sists of a number of cast iron bars, IG 
 d in figure 3, and shown in plan 
 in figure 4, placed so as to have in- 
 terstices between them, like the grate of an ordinary 
 
 Fig. 4. 
 
GEORGE C. F. HOLMZs. 15 
 
 fireplace. The top covering plate, cc, is perforated 
 with a number of circular holes of from one and a 
 half to three inches. in diameter, according to the size 
 of the boiler. Into each of these holes is fixed a 
 5 vertical tube of brass, wrought iron, or steel, shown 
 at ffff, figure 3. These tubes at their top ends 
 pass through similar holes in the plate, gg, which 
 is firmly riveted to the outside shell of the boiler. The 
 tubes thus connecting the plates, cc and gg, serve to 
 
 10 convey the flame, smoke, and hot air from the fire to 
 the smoke-box, //, and thence into the chimney, a ; and 
 at the same iime the sides of these tubes provide ample 
 surface to allow the heat from combustion to escape 
 into the water and set it boiling. The fresh fuel is 
 
 15 thrown on the grating through the fire-door, A, figure 2. 
 The ashes fall between the fire-bars into the ash-pit, B, 
 figure 3. 
 
 The water, which is contained in the space between 
 the shell of the boiler, the furnace-chamber, and the 
 
 20 tubes, is kept at about the level, ww, figure 3, the space 
 above being reserved for the rising steam. The steam 
 ascending into this space is thence led away by the 
 steam-pipe to the engine. Unless consumed quickl} 1 
 enough by the engine, the steam would accumulate in 
 
 25 the boiler and exert a pressure which would finally 
 burst the boiler. To provide against this danger the 
 steam, when it rises above a certain pressure, is allowed 
 to escape into the open air through the safety-valve 
 shown in sketch on the top of the boiler in figure 2. 
 
 30 We come now to the engine. The type selected for 
 illustration is that usually called horizontal single 
 cylinder, direct acting. Figure 5 is an elevation of the 
 
777^ STEAM-ENGINE. 
 
GEORGE C. K HOLMES. 17 
 
 exterior ; figure 6 is a horizontal section of the cylinder, 
 piston, and valve-box ; figure 7 is a plan, or a view of 
 the engine as you look directly down upon it. 
 
 The cylinder is shown at A, figures 5, 6, and 7 ; but 
 the construction is best seen from the section, figure 6. 
 The cylinder is of cast iron, with the ends flanged, so 
 that the cylinder covers, or end plates, aa, and the 
 
 Fig. 6. 
 
 frame, PP, may be bolted to it. The piston, shown at 
 B, is a circular cast iron disc, fitting the cylinder so 
 
 10 tightly that no steam can pass it. Into the piston is 
 fixed the piston-rod, C, which passes through the front 
 cylinder cover : the opening where it passes is made 
 steam-tight by the stuffing-box, D. The further end of 
 the piston-rod is fastened to the cross-head, E, figure 5 , 
 
 15 this cross-head is a joint for connecting the piston- 
 rod to the connecting-rod, F, so that the latter can 
 swing up and down, as the piston and piston-rod travel 
 backward and forward. The cross-head is also pro- 
 vided with two slides, ee, figure 5, which move between 
 
 20 the guide-bars,^ figures 5 and 6, and which keep the 
 piston-rod from being bent, and from moving otherwise 
 than in a straight line. The connecting-rod, F, joins 
 2 
 
iS 
 
 THE STEAM-ENGINE. 
 
GEORGE C. V. HOLMES. 19 
 
 the end of the piston-rod to the crank-pin, G. This 
 pin turns about an axle, the crank-axle, which is shown 
 in section at H, figure 5, but is seen more clearly in 
 the plan, figure 7, where the axle passes through the 
 5 two bearings, LL. 
 
 When the steam is allowed to flow from the boiler 
 into the cylinder, so as to obtain admission into the 
 space to the left of the piston in figure 6, the piston 
 oegins to move, carrying with it the piston-rod, the 
 
 10 cross-head, and the connecting-rod. Since, however, 
 the further end of the connecting-rod is fastened to the 
 crank-pin, G, figure 5, this further end can move only 
 in the circle which the pin must describe about its 
 axle. Consequently, when the motion of the piston 
 
 1 5 drives the connecting-rod away from the cylinder, 
 the crank-pin will be pushed through a part of the 
 circle indicated by the dotted line say from G to G' in 
 figure 5 ; then the momentum of the wheel to which 
 the crank-pin is attached will carry the pin a little 
 
 20 further down along the same dotted line. If at this 
 moment the steam is cut off from the side of the pis- 
 ton on which it has been pressing, and at the same 
 instant is allowed to rush into the other end of the 
 cylinder, then the piston will be driven in the contrary 
 
 25 direction, and the crank-pin, together with the wheel to 
 which it is fastened, will be pulled through the com- 
 plete circle. This operation of impelling the piston 
 backward and forward may be repeated as often as we 
 like, and the piston, working through the connecting- 
 
 3 rod and crank-pin, may thus turn a wheel continuously 
 and drive machinery, provided only that we have a 
 suitable contrivance for admitting the steam to the 
 
20 
 
 THE STEAM-ENGINE. 
 
 sides of the piston alternately, and alternately letting 
 it escape into the open air or into a condenser. 
 
 The admission of the steam is regulated as follows : 
 In figure 6 is shown a box-like casing, MM, cast in one 
 pjece with the cylinder, and on one side of it. This 5 
 box contains the valve, V, which controls the flow of 
 the steam. For the sake of clearness, the following 
 diagram, figure 8, is given to exhibit the valve and the 
 side of the cylinder drawn to a larger scale. The side 
 of the cylinder next the valve-box has two passages, 10 
 
 Fig. 8. 
 
 ,$/, called the steam-ports, because through them the 
 steam gains access to the cylinder and escapes from it. 
 When the engine is at work, the cast iron box contain- 
 ing the valve is always filled with steam from the boiler. 
 When the valve occupies the position shown in figure 15 
 8, the steam cannot enter the cylinder at all, because 
 both ports are covered by the valve. If the valve, 
 however, be moved a little to the right, so as to uncover 
 the steam-port, s, two things will happen : first, the 
 steam will pass through the port,^,into the cylinder, and 20 
 will push the piston from left to right ; and secondly, 
 
GEORGE C. V. HOLMES. 
 
 21 
 
 the port, /, will be uncovered by the inner edge of the 
 valve, so that the steam in the right end of the cylinder 
 will escape through the port, /, into the interior hollow 
 of the valve, and thence into the exhaust-passage, ^, 
 5 which leads either into the open air or into a condenser. 
 This arrangement of the valve is shown in figure 9. 
 If, when the piston has reached the end of its forward 
 stroke, the valve be moved back to the corresponding 
 
 Fig. 9- 
 
 position on the other side, the steam from the boiler 
 10 can enter the cylinder through / and force the piston 
 back from right to left, while the steam on the left of 
 the piston will escape through s into the exhaust-pas- 
 sage. The sliding-valve is thrown backward and for- 
 ward by the action of an eccentric moving on the same 
 15 axle as the crank-pin. This piece of mechanism, how 
 ever, will be explained in another chapter. 
 
II. 
 
 tTbe iPbESfcal ;!Baste of Xffc. 
 THOMAS HENRY HUXLEY, 1825. 
 
 The substance of this paper was contained in a discourse de- 
 livered in Edinburgh Sunday evening, November 8, 1868, the first 
 of a series of Sunday evening addresses upon secular topics, in- 
 stituted by the Rev. J. Cranbrook. The paper was printed in 1871 
 under the title, " On the Physical Basis of Life," in Huxley's 
 " Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews," and again in 1894 in the 
 first volume of Huxley's collected writings, entitled " Methods 
 and Results." 
 
 This piece of scientific exposition has three notable excellences. 
 For one thing, the words are so simple, that, though not perhaps 
 intelligible to a child, they may be easily understood by a man of 
 fair education. Secondly, the divisions of the subject are distinct : 
 in order to show that " a unity of power or faculty, a unity of form, 
 and a unity of substantial composition " pervade " the whole liv- 
 ing world," Huxley discusses each of these three unities separately. 
 Lastly, he makes general statements vivid by the use of specific 
 examples. 
 
 IN order to make the title of this discourse generally 
 intelligible, I have translated the term " Protoplasm/' 
 which is the scientific name of the substance of which 
 I am about to speak, by the words " the physical basis 
 of life." I suppose that, to many, the idea that there 5 
 is such a thing as a physical basis, or matter, of life 
 
 22 
 
: 
 
 THOMAS ffENR Y HUXLE Y. 23 
 
 may be novel so widely spread is the conception of 
 life as a something which works through matter, but is 
 independent of it ; and even those who are aware that 
 matter and life are inseparably connected, may not be 
 5 prepared for the conclusion plainly suggested by the 
 phrase, "///^physical basis or matter of life," that there 
 is some one kind of matter which is common to all liv- 
 ing beings, and that their endless diversities are bound 
 together by a physical, as well as an ideal, unity. In 
 
 f "of act, when first apprehended, such a doctrine as this 
 appears almost shocking to common sense. 
 What, truly, can seem to be more obviously different 
 from one another, in faculty, in form, and in substance, er-j 
 than the various kinds of living beings ? What com- 
 
 I 5munityof faculty can there be between the brightly- 
 colored lichen, which so nearly resembles a mere 
 mineral incrustation of the bare rock on which it grows, 
 and the painter, to whom it is instinct with beauty, 
 or the botanist, whom it feeds with knowledge ? 
 \2o Again, mink of the microscopic fungus a mere in- 
 finitesimal ovoid particle, which finds space and dura- 
 tion enough to multiply into countless millions in the 
 body of a living fly ; and then of the wealth of foliage, 
 the luxuriance of flower and fruit, which lies between 
 
 25 this bald sketch of a plant and the giant pme of Cal- 
 ifornia, towering to the dimensions of a cathedral spire, 
 or the Indian g, which covers acres with its profound 
 shadow, and endures while nations and empires come 
 and go around its vast circumference. Or, turning to 
 
 30 the other half of the world of life, picture to yourselves 
 the great Finner whale, hugest of beasts that live, or 
 have lived, disporting his eighty or ninety feet of bone, 
 
24 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 muscle, and blubber, with easy roll, among waves in 
 which the stoutest ship that ever left dockyard would 
 flounder hopelessly ; and contrast him with the invisible 
 animalcules mere gelatinous specks, multitudes of 
 which could, in fact, dance upon the point of a needle 5 
 with the same ease as the angels of the Schoolmen 
 could, in imagination. With these images before your 
 minds, you may well ask, what community of form, or 
 structure, is there between the animalcule and the 
 whale ; or between the fungus and the fig-tree ? And, 10 
 a fortiori, between all four ? 
 
 Finally, if we regard substance, or material composi- 
 tion, what hidden bond can connect the flower which 
 a girl wears in her hair and the bloo,d which courses 
 through her youthful veins; or, what is therein com- 15 
 mon between the dense and resisting mass of the oal^, 
 or the strong fabric of the tortoise, and those broad 
 disks of glassy jelly which may be seen pulsating 
 through the waters of a calm sea, but which drain away 
 to mere films in the hand which raises them out of 20 
 f their element ? 
 
 Such objections as these must, I think, arise in the 
 mind of every one who ponders, for the first time, upon 
 the conception of a single physical basis of life under- 
 lying all the diversities of vital existence ; but I pro- 25 
 pose to demonstrate to you that, notwithstanding these 
 apparent difficulties, a threefold unity namely, a unity 
 of power or faculty, a unity of form, and a unity of sub- 
 stantial composition does pervade the whole living 
 world. 30 
 
 No very abstruse argumentation is needed, in the first 
 place to prove that the powers, or faculties, of all kinds 
 
THOMAS HENR Y HUXLE Y. 25 
 
 of living matter, diverse as they may be in degree, are 
 substantially similar in kind. 
 
 Goethe has condensed a survey of all powers of man- 
 kind into the well-known epigram : 
 
 " Warum treibt sich das Volk so und schreit ? Es will sich 
 
 ernahren 
 Kinder zeugen, und die nahren so gut es vermag. 
 
 * * * # 
 
 Weiter bringt es kein Mensch, stell' er sich wie er auch will." 
 
 5 In physiological language this means, that all the 
 multifarious and complicated activities of man are com- 
 prehensible under three categories. Either they are 
 immediately directed towards the maintenance and de- 
 velopment of the body, or they effect transitory changes 
 
 10 in the relative positions of parts of the body, or they 
 tend towards the continuance of the species. Even 
 those manifestations of intellect, of feeling, and of will, 
 which we rightly name the higher faculties, are not ex- 
 cluded from this classification, inasmuch as to every 
 
 r 5one but the subject of them, they are known only as 
 transitory changes in the relative positions of parts of 
 the body. Speech, gesture, and every other form of 
 human action are, in the long run, resolvable into mus- 
 cular contraction, and muscular contraction is but a 
 
 20 transitory change in the relative positions of the parts 
 of a muscle. But the scheme which is large enough to 
 embrace the activities of the highest form of life, covers 
 all those of the lower creatures. The lowest plant, or 
 animalcule, feeds, grows, and reproduces its kind. In 
 
 25 addition, all animals manifest those transitory changes 
 of form which we class under irritability and contrac- 
 
26 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 tility; and, it is more than probable, that when the 
 vegetable world is thoroughly explored, we shall find all 
 plants in possession of the same powers, at one time or 
 other of their existence. 
 
 I am not now alluding to such phenomena, at once 5 
 rare and conspicuous, as those exhibited by the leaflets 
 of the sensitive plants, or the stamens of the barberry, 
 but to much more widely spread, and at the same time, 
 more subtle and hidden, manifestations of vegetable 
 contractility. You are doubtless aware that the com- ic 
 mon nettle owes its stinging property to the innumera- 
 ble stiff and needle-like, though exquisitely delicate, 
 hairs which cover its surface. Each stinging-needle 
 tapers from a broad base to a slender summit, which, 
 though rounded at the end, is of such microscopic fine- 15 
 ness that it readily penetrates, and breaks off in, the 
 skin. The whole hair consists of a very delicate outer 
 case of wood, closely applied to the inner surface of 
 which is a layer of semifluid matter, full of innumerable 
 granules of extreme minuteness. This semi-fluid lin-2o 
 ing is protoplasm, which thus constitutes a kind of bag, 
 full of limpid liquid, and roughly corresponding in form 
 with the interior of the hair which it fills. When viewed 
 with a sufficiently high magnifying power, the proto- 
 plasmic layer of the nettle hair is seen to be in a con- 25 
 dition of unceasing activity. Local contractions of the 
 whole thickness of its substance pass slowly and grad- 
 ually from point to point, and give rise to the appear- 
 ance of progressive waves, just as the bending of suc- 
 cessive stalks of corn by a breeze produces rne apparent 3 
 billows of a cornfield. 
 
 But, in addition to these movements, and independ* 
 
THOMAS HENR Y HUXLE K 27 
 
 ently of them, the granules are driven, in relatively 
 rapid streams, through channels in the protoplasm which 
 seem to have a considerable amount of persistence. 
 Most commonly, the currents in adjacent parts of the 
 5 protoplasm take similar directions ; and, thus, there is 
 a general stream up one side of the hair and down the 
 other. But this does not prevent the existence of 
 partial currents which take different routes ; and some- 
 times trains of granules may be seen coursing swiftly 
 
 10 in opposite directions within a twenty-thousandth of 
 an inch of one another ; while, occasionally, opposite 
 streams come into direct collision, and, after a longer 
 or shorter struggle, one predominates. The cause of 
 these currents seems to lie in contractions of the proto- 
 
 15 plasm which bounds the channels in which they flow, 
 but which are so minute that the best microscopes show 
 only their effects, and not themselves. 
 
 The spectacle afforded by the wonderful energies 
 prisoned within the compass of the microscopic hair of 
 
 20 a plant, which we commonly regard as a merely passive 
 organism, is not easily forgotten by one who has 
 watched its display, continued hour after hour, without 
 pause or sign of weakening. The possible complexity 
 of many other organic forms, seemingly as simple as 
 
 25 the protoplasm of the nettle, dawns upon one ; and the 
 comparison of such a protoplasm to a body with an in- 
 ternal circulation, which has been put forward by an 
 eminent physiologist, loses much of its startling char- 
 acter. Currents similar to those of the hairs of the 
 
 30 nettle have been observed in a great multitude of very 
 different plants, and weighty authorities have suggested 
 that they probably occur, in more or less perfection, in 
 
28 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 all young vegetable cells. If such be the case, the 
 wonderful noonday silence of a tropical forest is, after 
 all, due only to the dullness of our hearing ; and could 
 our ears catch the murmur of these tiny Maelstroms, 
 as they whirl in the innumerable myriads of living cells 5 
 which constitute each tree, we should be stunned, as 
 with the roar of a great city. 
 
 Among the lower plants, it is the rule rather than 
 the exception, that contractility should be still more 
 openly manifested at some periods of their existence. a 
 The protoplasm of Algce and Fungi becomes, under 
 many circumstances, partially, or completely, freed 
 from its woody case, and exhibits movements of its 
 whole mass, or is propelled by the contractility of one, 
 or more, hair-like prolongations of its body, which are 15 
 called vibratile cilia. And, so far as the conditions of 
 the manifestation of the phenomena of contractility 
 have yet been studied, they are the same for the plant 
 as for the animal. Heat and electric shocks influence 
 both, and in the same way, though it may be in different 20 
 degrees. It is by no means my intention to suggest 
 that there is no difference in faculty between the lowest 
 plant and the highest, or between plants and animals. 
 But the difference between the powers of the lowest 
 plant, or animal, and those of the highest, is one of 2* 
 degree, not of kind, and depends, as Milne-Edwards 
 long ago so well pointed out, upon the extent to which 
 the principle of the division of labor is carried out in 
 the living economy. In the lowest organism all parts 
 are competent to perform all functions, and one and 30 
 the same portion of protoplasm may successfully take 
 on the function of feeding, moving, or reproducing ap- 
 
THOMAS HEtfR Y HUXLE Y. 29 
 
 paratus. In the highest, on the contrary, a great num- 
 ber of parts combine to perform each function, each 
 part doing its allotted share of the work with great 
 accuracy and efficiency, but being useless for any other 
 t 5 purpose. 
 
 On the other hand, notwithstanding all the funda- 
 mental resemblances which exist between the powers 
 of the protoplasm in plants and in animals, they present 
 a striking difference (to which I shall advert more at 
 
 10 length presently), in the fact that plants can manu- 
 facture fresh protoplasm out of mineral compounds, 
 whereas animals are obliged to procure it ready made, 
 and hence, in the long run, depend upon plants. Upon 
 what condition this difference in the powers of the two 
 
 1 5 great divisions of the world of life depends, nothing is 
 at present known. 
 
 With such qualifications as arise out of the last- > j 
 mentioned fact, it may be truly said that the acts 
 of all living things are fundamentally one. 2 * Is 
 
 20 any such unity predicable of their forms ? Let us 
 seek in easily verified facts for a reply to this ques- 
 tion. If a drop of blood be drawn by pricking one's 
 finger, and viewed with proper precautions, and under 
 a sufficiently high microscopic power, there will be /$ 
 
 25 seen, among the innumerable multitude of little, cir- '' 
 cular, discoidal bodies, or corpuscles, which float in it 
 and give it its color, a comparatively small number of 
 colorless corpuscles, of somewhat larger size and very 
 irregular shape. If the drop of blood be kept at the 
 
 30 temperature of the body, these colorless corpuscles 
 
 * Before proceeding to discuss " unity of form," Huxley thus 
 briefly sums up what he has said of " unity of power or faculty." 
 
30 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 will be seen to exhibit a marvellous activity, changing 
 their forms with great rapidity, drawing in and thrust- 
 ing out prolongations of their substance, and creeping 
 about as if they were independent organisms. 
 
 The substance which is thus active is a mass of q 
 protoplasm*, and its activity differs in detail, rather 
 than in principle, from that of the protoplasm of the 
 nettle. Under sundry circumstances the corpuscle 
 dies and becomes distended into a round mass, in the 
 midst of which is seen a smaller spherical body, which ic 
 existed, but was more or less hidden, in the living 
 corpuscle, and is called its nucleus. Corpuscles of 
 essentially similar structure are to be found in the skin, 
 in the lining of the mouth, and scattered through the 
 whole framework of the body. Nay, more; in the 15 
 earliest condition of the human organism, in that state 
 in which it has but just become distinguishable from 
 the egg in which it arises, it is nothing but an aggrega- 
 tion of such corpuscles, and every organ of the body 
 was, once, no more than such an aggregation. 20 
 
 Thus a nucleated mass of protoplasm turns out to 
 be what may be termed the structural unit of the 
 human body. As a matter of fact, the body, in its 
 earliest state, is a mere multiple of such units ; and in 
 its perfect condition, it is a multiple of such units, 25 
 variously modified. 
 
 But does the formula which expresses the essential 
 structural character of the highest animal cover all 
 the rest, as the statement of its powers and faculties 
 covered that of all others ? Very nearly. Beast and 30 
 fowl, reptile and fish, mollusk, worm, and polype, are 
 all composed of structural units of the same character, 
 
THOMAS HENR Y HUXL &. 31 
 
 namely, masses of protoplasm with a nucleus. There 
 are sundry very low animals, each of which, structur- 
 ally, is a mere colorless blood-corpuscle, leading an 
 independent life. But, at the very bottom of the animal 
 5 scale, even this simplicity becomes simplified, and all 
 the phenomena of life are manifested by a particle of 
 protoplasm without a nucleus. Nor are such organisms 
 insignificant by reason of their want of complexity. It 
 is a fair question whether the protoplasm of those 
 
 10 simplest forms of life, which people an immense extent 
 of the bottom of the sea, would not outweigh that of 
 all the higher living beings which inhabit the land put 
 together. And in ancient times, no less than at the 
 present day, such living beings as these have been the 
 
 15 greatest of rock builders. 
 
 What has been said of the animal world is no less 
 true of plants. Imbedded in the protoplasm at the 
 broad, or attached, end of the nettle hair, there lies 
 a spheroidal nucleus. Careful examination further 
 
 20 proves that the whole substance of the nettle is made 
 up of a repetition of such masses of nucleated proto- 
 plasm, each contained in a wooden case, which is modi- 
 fied in form, sometimes into^t woody fibre, sometimes 
 into a duct or spiral vessel, sometimes into a pollen 
 
 25 grain, or an ovule. Traced back to its earliest state, 
 the nettle arises as the man does, in a particle of 
 nucleated protoplasm. And in the lowest plants, as in 
 the lowest animals, a single mass of such protoplasm 
 may constitute the whole plant, or the protoplasm may 
 
 30 exist without a nucleus. 
 
 Under these circumstances it may well be asked, 
 how is one mass of non-nucleated protoplasm to be 
 
32 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF 
 
 distinguished from another ? why call one " plant " 
 and the other " animal " ? 
 
 The only reply is that, so far as form is concerned, 
 plants and animals are not separable, and that, in many 
 cases, it is a mere matter of convention whether we 5 
 call a given organism an animal or a plant. There is 
 a living body called ^Ethalium septicum, which appears 
 upon decaying vegetable substances, and, in one of its 
 forms, is common upon the surfaces of tan-pits. In 
 this condition it is, to all intents and purposes, a fungus, 10 
 and formerly was always regarded as such ; but the 
 remarkable investigations of De Bary have shown 
 that, in another condition, the sEthalium is an actively 
 locomotive creature, and takes in solid matters, upon 
 which, apparently, it feeds, thus exhibiting the most 15 
 characteristic feature of animality. Is this a plant ; or 
 is it an animal? Is it both; or is it neither? Some 
 decide in favor of the last supposition, and establish 
 an intermediate kingdom, a sort of biological No Man's 
 Land for all these questionable forms. But, as it is 20 
 admittedly impossible to draw any distinct boundary 
 line between this no man's land and the vegetable 
 world on the one hand, or the animal, on the other, it 
 appears to me that this proceeding merely doubles the 
 difficulty which, before, was single. 25 
 
 Protoplasm, simple or nucleated, is the formal basis 
 of all life. It is the clay of the potter : which, bake it 
 and paint it as he will, remains clay, separated by arti- 
 fice, and not by nature, from the commonest brick or 
 sun-dried clod. 30 
 
 Thus it becomes clear that all living powers are cog- 
 nate, and that all living forms are fundamentally of 
 
THOMAS HENR Y HUXLE Y. 33 
 
 one character.* The researches of the chemist have 
 revealed a no less striking uniformity of material com- 
 position in living matter. 
 
 In perfect strictness, it is true that chemical investi- 
 
 5 gation can tell us little or nothing, directly, of the com- 
 position of living matter, inasmuch as such mattei 
 must needs die in the act of analysis, and upon this 
 very obvious ground, objections, which I confess seen) 
 to me to be somewhat frivolous, have been raised to 
 
 10 the drawing of any conclusions whatever respecting 
 the composition of actually living matter, from that of 
 the dead matter of life, which alone is accessible to us. 
 But objectors of this class do not seem to reflect that 
 it is also, in strictness, true that we know nothing 
 
 1 5 about the composition of any body whatever, as it is. 
 The statement that a crystal of calc-spar consists of 
 carbonate of lime, is quite true, if we only mean that, 
 by appropriate processes, it may be resolved into 
 carbonic acid and quicklime. If you pass the same 
 
 20 carbonic acid over the very quicklime thus obtained, 
 you will obtain carbonate of lime again ; but it will not 
 be calc-spar, nor anything like it. Can it, therefore, 
 be said that chemical analysis teaches nothing about 
 the chemical composition of calc-spar ? Such a state- 
 
 25 ment would be absurd ; but it is hardly more so than 
 the talk one occasionally hears about the uselessness 
 of applying the results of chemical analysis to the 
 living bodies which have yielded them. 
 
 One fact, at any rate, is out of reach of such refine- 
 
 * Before taking up the last point, " unity of substantial compo- 
 sition," Huxley briefly summarizes the two points already treated, 
 " unity of power or faculty," and " unity of form." 
 
34 THE PHYSTCAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 ments, and this is, that all the forms of protoplasm 
 which have yet been examined contain the four ele- 
 ments, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen, in very 
 complex union, and that they behave similarly towards 
 several re-agents. To this complex combination, the * 
 nature of which has never been determined with exact 
 ness, the name of Proteine has been applied. And if 
 we use this term with such caution as may properly 
 arise out of our comparative ignorance of the things 
 for which it stands, it may be truly said, that all pro- ia 
 toplasm is proteinaceous, or, as the white, or albumen, 
 of an egg is one of the commonest examples of a nearly 
 pure proteine matter, we may say that all living matter 
 is more or less albuminoid. 
 
 Perhaps it would not yet be safe to say that all forms 15 
 of protoplasm are affected by the direct action of electric 
 shocks; and yet the number of cases in which the 
 contraction of protoplasm is shown to be affected by 
 this agency increases every day. 
 
 Nor can it be affirmed with perfect confidence, that 20 
 all forms of protoplasm are liable to undergo that 
 peculiar coagulation at a temperature of 40 50 
 centigrade, which has been called " heat-stiffening," 
 though Klihne's beautiful researches have proved this 
 . occurrence to take place in so many and such diverse 25 
 living beings, that it is hardly rash to expect that the 
 law holds good for all. 
 
 Enough has, perhaps, been said to prove the existence 
 of a general uniformity in the character of the pro 30 
 toplasm, or physical basis, of life, in whatever group of 
 living beings it may be studied. But it will be under- 
 
THOMAS HENR Y HUXLE Y. ..35 
 
 stood that this general uniformity by no means excludes 
 any amount of special modifications of the fundamental 
 substance. The mineral, carbonate of lime, assumes 
 an immense diversity of characters, though no one 
 5 doubts that, under all these Protean changes, it is one 
 and the same thing. 
 
 And now, what is the ultimate fate, and what the 
 origin, of the matter of life ? 
 
 Is it, as some of the older naturalists supposed, 
 
 10 diffused throughout the universe in molecules, which 
 are indestructible and unchangeable in themselves ; 
 but, in endless transmigration, unite in innumerable 
 permutations, into the diversified forms of life we know ? 
 Or, is the matter of life composed of ordinary matter, 
 
 15 differing from it only in the manner in which its atoms 
 are aggregated ? Is it built up of ordinary matter, 
 and again resolved into ordinary matter when its work 
 is done ? 
 
 Modern science does not hesitate a moment between 
 
 20 these alternatives. Physiology writes over the portals 
 of life 
 
 "Debemur morti nos nostraque," 
 
 with a profounder meaning than the Roman poet at- 
 tached to that melancholy line. Under whatever dis- 
 guise it takes refuge, whether fungus or oak, worm or 
 
 25 man, the living protoplasm not only ultimately dies 
 and is resolved into its mineral and lifeless constitu- 
 ents, but is always dying, and, strange as the paradox 
 may sound, could not live unless it died. 
 
 In the wonderful story of the " Peau de Chagrin, " 
 
 30 the hero becomes possessed of a magical wild ass' 
 
36 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 skin, which yields him the means of gratifying all his 
 wishes. But its surface represents the duration of 
 the proprietor's life ; and for every satisfied desire the 
 skin shrinks in proportion to the intensity of fruition, 
 until at length life and the last handbreadth of the 5 
 peau de chagrin, disappear with the gratification of a 
 last wish. 
 
 Balzac's studies had led him over a wide range of 
 thought and speculation, and his shadowing forth of 
 physiological truth in this strange story may have been 10 
 intentional. At any rate, the matter of life is a veri- 
 table peau de chagrin, and for every vital act it is some* 
 what the smaller. All work implies waste, aud the 
 work of life results, directly or indirectly, in the waste 
 of protoplasm. 15 
 
 Every word uttered by a speaker costs him some 
 physical loss; and, in the strictest sense, he burns 
 that others may have light so much eloquence, so 
 much of his body resolved into carbonic acid, water, 
 and urea. It is clear that this process of expenditure 20 
 cannot go on forever. But, happily, the protoplasmic 
 peau de chagrin differs from Balzac's in its capacity of 
 being repaired, and brought back to its full size, after 
 every exertion. 
 
 For example, this present lecture, whatever its intel- 2 5 
 lectual worth to you, has a certain physical value to me, 
 which is, conceivably, expressible by the number of 
 grains of protoplasm and other bodily substance wasted 
 in maintaining my vital processes during its delivery. 
 Myfleau de chagrin will be distinctly smaller at the end 3 
 of the discourse than it was at the beginning. By and 
 by, I shall probably have recourse to the substance ; 
 
THOMAS HENRY HVXLEY. 
 
 37 
 
 commonly called mutton, for the purpose of stretching 
 it back to its original size. Now this mutton was once 
 the living protoplasm, more or less modified, of another 
 animal a sheep. As I shall eat it, it is the same 
 5 matter altered, not only by death, but by exposure to sun- 
 dry artificial operations in the process of cooking. 
 
 But these changes, whatever be their extent, have 
 not rendered it incompetent to resume its old functions 
 as matter of life. A singular inward laboratory, which 
 
 :o I possess, will dissolve a certain portion of the modified 
 protoplasm ; the solution so formed will pass into my 
 veins ; and the subtle influences to which it will then 
 be subjected will convert the dead protoplasm into liv- 
 ing protoplasm, and transubstantiate sheep into man. 
 
 r 5 Nor is this all. If digestion were a thing to be trifled 
 
 with, I might sup upon lobster, and the matter of life 
 
 of the crustacean would undergo the same wonderful 
 
 . metamorphosis into humanity. And were I to return 
 
 to my own place by sea, and undergo shipwreck, the 
 
 20 crustacean might, and probably would, return the compli- 
 ment, and demonstrate our common nature by turning 
 my protoplasm into living lobster. Or, if nothing 
 better were to be had, I might supply my wants with 
 mere bread, and I should find the protoplasm of the 
 
 25 wheat-plant to be convertible into man, with no more 
 trouble than that of the sheep, and with far less, I fancy, 
 than that of the lobster. 
 
 Hence it appears to be a matter of no great moment 
 what animal, or what plant, I lay under contribution 
 
 30 for protoplasm, and the fact speaks volumes for the 
 general identity of that substance in all living beings. 
 I share this catholicity of assimilation with other 
 
38 THE PHYSICAL BASIS OF LIFE. 
 
 animals, all of which, so far as we know, could thrive 
 equally well on the protoplasm of any of their fellows, 
 or of any plant ; but here the assimilative powers of the 
 animal world cease. A solution of smelling-salts in 
 water, with an infinitesimal proportion of some other 5 
 saline matters, contains all the elementary bodies which 
 enter into the composition of protoplasm ; but, as T 
 need hardly say, a hogshead of that fluid would not 
 keep a hungry man from starving, nor would it save 
 any animal whatever from a like fate. An animal can- IG 
 not make protoplasm, but must take it ready-made from 
 some other animal, or some plant the animal's highest 
 feat of constructive chemistry being to convert dead 
 protoplasm into that living matter of life which is 
 appropriate to itself. 15 
 
 Therefore, in seeking for the origin of protoplasm, 
 we must eventually turn to the vegetable world. A 
 fluid containing carbonic acid, water, and nitrogenous 
 salts, which offers such a Barmecide feast to the animal, 
 is a table richly spread to multitudes of plants ; and, 20 
 with a due supply of only such materials, many a plant 
 will not only maintain itself in vigor, but grow and 
 multiply until it has increased a million-fold, or a mill- 
 ion million-fold, the quantity of protoplasm which it 
 originally possessed ; in this way building up the matter 25 
 of life, to an indefinite extent, from the common matter 
 of the universe. 
 
 Thus, the animal can only raise the complex substance 
 of dead protoplasm to the higher power, as one may say, 
 of living protoplasm ; while the plant can raise the less 3 C 
 complex substances carbonic acid, water, and nitroge- 
 nous sa>" to the same stage of living protoplasm, if not 
 
THOMAS HENR Y HUXLE Y. 39 
 
 to the same level. But the plant also has its limitations. 
 Some of the fungi, for example, appear to need highei 
 compounds to start with ; and no known plant can live 
 upon the uncompounded elements of protoplasm. A 
 
 5 plant supplied with pure carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and 
 nitrogen, phosphorus, sulphur, and the like, would as 
 infallibly die as the animal in his bath of smelling-salts, 
 though it would be surrounded by all the constituents of 
 protoplasm. Nor, indeed, need the process of simplifi- 
 
 10 cation of vegetable food be carried so far as this, in 
 order to arrive at the limit of the plant's thaumaturgy. 
 Let water, carbonic acid, and all the other needful con- 
 stituents be supplied except nitrogenous salts, and an 
 ordinary plant will still be unable to manufacture 
 
 1 5 protoplasm. 
 
 Thus the matter of life, so far as we know it (and we 
 have no right to speculate on any other), breaks up, in 
 consequence of that continual death which is the con- 
 dition of its manifesting vitality, into carbonic acid, 
 
 20 water, and nitrogenous compounds, which certainly 
 possess no properties but those of ordinary matter. 
 And out of these same forms of ordinary matter, and 
 from none which are simpler, the vegetable world builds 
 up all the protoplasm which keeps the animal world a- 
 
 ,< going. Plants are the accumulators of the power which 
 animals distribute and disperse.* 
 
 * The rest of the paper is an argument based upon the exposi- 
 tion. 
 
III. 
 
 Gbaracter and policy of Gbarles tbe Seconfc. 
 JOHN RICHARD GREEN, 1837-1883. 
 
 This extract follows a passage discussing the changes wrought 
 in England by the Commonwealth and by the Restoration, Chap- 
 ter I., Book VIII., John Richard Green's " History of the English 
 People." New York, 1880. 
 
 The historian, in order to make vivid to the reader his concep- 
 tion of the character and policy of Charles the Second, uses bits 
 of personal description and scraps of narrative, subordinated to 
 the general purpose of exposition ; and, in so far as space per- 
 mits, he shows each trait in the concrete form of word and deed. 
 For example, the attitude of Charles towards the House of Lords 
 is expressed in the king's remark that the debates there " amused " 
 him; This method of Green's is in essence that of the story- 
 teller, who displays a man's character by letting him talk and act 
 before us ; and this history is entertaining, partly because Eliza- 
 beth, James the First, Cromwell, Charles the Second, and Wai- 
 pole are made to live in its pages by the same literary device by 
 which Tom Jones, Dr. Primrose, and Becky Sharp live in the 
 pages of fiction. 
 
 CHANGED to the very core, yet hardly conscious of the 
 change, drifting indeed steadily towards a wider knowl- 
 edge and a firmer freedom, but still a mere medley 
 of Puritan morality and social revolt, of traditional 
 loyalty and political scepticism, of bigotry and free $ 
 inquiry, of science and Popish plots, the England of the 
 40 
 
JOHN RICHARD GREEN. 41 
 
 Restoration was reflected in its King. What his sub- 
 jects saw in Charles the Second was a pleasant, brown- 
 faced gentleman playing with his spaniels, or drawing 
 caricatures of his ministers, or flinging cakes to the water- 
 
 5 fowl in the park. To all outer seeming Charles was the 
 most consummate of idlers. " He delighted," says one of 
 his courtiers, " in a bewitching kind of pleasure called 
 sauntering." The business-like Pepys discovered, as he 
 brought his work to the Council Board, that " the King 
 
 10 do mind nothing but pleasures, and hates the very sight 
 or thoughts of business." That Charles had great nat- 
 ural parts no one doubted. In his earlier days of defeat 
 and danger he showed a cool courage and presence of 
 mind which never failed him in the many perilous 
 
 15 moments of his reign. His temper was pleasant and 
 social, his manners perfect, and there was a careless 
 freedom and courtesy in his address which won over 
 everybody who came into his presence. His education 
 indeed had been so grossly neglected that he could 
 
 20 hardly read a plain Latin book ; but his natural, quick- 
 ness and intelligence showed itself in his pursuit of 
 chemistry and anatomy, and in the interest he showed 
 in the scientific inquiries of the Royal Society. Like 
 Peter the Great his favorite study was that of naval 
 
 25 architecture, and he piqued himself on being a clever 
 shipbuilder. He had some little love too for art and 
 poetry, and a taste for music. But his shrewdness and 
 vivacity showed themselves most in his endless talk. 
 He was fond of telling stories, and he told them with 
 
 30 a good deal of grace and humor. He held his own fairly 
 with the wits of his Court, and bandied repartees on 
 equal terms with Sedley or Buckingham. Even Roches- 
 
42 POLICY OF CHARLES THE SECOND. 
 
 ter in his merciless epigram was forced to own that 
 " Charles never said a foolish thing." He had inherited 
 in fact his grandfather's gift of pithy sayings, and his 
 habitual irony often gave an amusing turn to them. 
 When his brother, the most unpopular man in Eng- 5 
 land, solemnly warned him of plots against his life, 
 Charles laughingly bade him set all fear aside. " They 
 will never kill me, James," he said, " to make you 
 king." 
 
 But courage and wit and ability seemed to have been 10 
 bestowed on Charles in vain. He only laughed when 
 Tom Killigrew told him frankly that badly as things 
 were going on there was one man whose industry could 
 set them right, "and this is one Charles Stuart, 
 who now spends his time in using his lips about the 15 
 Court and hath no other employment." Charles made 
 no secret in fact of his hatred of business. Nor did he 
 give to outer observers any sign of ambition. The one 
 thing he seemed in earnest about was sensual pleasure, 
 and he took his pleasure with a cynical shamelessness 20 
 which roused the disgust even of his shameless courtiers. 
 Mistress followed mistress, and the guilt of a troop of 
 profligate women was blazoned to the world by the gift 
 of titles and estates. ... But Charles was far from 
 being content with a single form of self-indulgence. Gam- 25 
 bling and drinking helped to fill up the vacant moments 
 when he could no longer toy with his favorites or bet 
 at Newmarket. No thought of remorse or of shame 
 seems ever to have crossed his mind. " He could not 
 think God would make a man miserable," he said once, 30 
 " only for taking a little pleasure out of the way." From 
 shame he was shielded by his cynical disbelief in human 
 
JOHN RICHARD GREEN. 43 
 
 virtue. Virtue indeed he regarded simply as a trick by 
 which clever hypocrites imposed upon fools. Honor 
 among men seemed to him as mere a pretence as chastity 
 among women. Gratitude he had none, for he looked 
 5 upon self-interest as the only motive of men's actions, 
 and though soldiers had died and women had risked 
 their lives for him, " he loved others as little as he 
 thought they loved him." But if he felt no gratitude for 
 benefits, he felt no resentment for wrongs. He was 
 
 10 incapable either of love or of hate. The only feeling 
 he retained for his fellow-men was that of an amused 
 contempt. 
 
 It was difficult for Englishmen to believe that any 
 real danger to liberty could come from an idler and a 
 
 15 voluptuary such as Charles the Second. But in the 
 very difficulty of believing this lay half the King's 
 strength. He had in fact no taste whatever for the 
 despotism of the Stuarts who had gone before him. 
 His shrewdness laughed his grandfather's theories of 
 
 20 Divine Right down the wind, while his indolence made 
 such a personal administration as that which his father 
 delighted in burthensome to him. He was too humor- 
 ous a man to care for the pomp and show of power, 
 and too good-natured a man to play the tyxant. But 
 
 25 he believed as firmly as his father or his grandfather 
 had believed in his right to a full possession of the 
 older prerogatives of the Crown. He looked on Parlia- 
 ments as they had looked on them with suspicion and 
 jealousy. He clung as they had clung to the dream of 
 
 30 a dispensing power over the execution of the laws. He 
 regarded ecclesiastical affairs as lying within his own 
 personal control, and viewed the interference of the 
 
44 POLICY OF CHARLES THE SECOND. 
 
 two Houses with church matters as a sheear usurpation. 
 Above all he detested the notion of ministerial responsi- 
 bility to any but the King, or of a Parliamentary right 
 to interfere in any way with the actual administration 
 of public affairs. " He told Lord Essex," Burnet says, 5 
 " that he did not wish to be like a Grand Signior, with 
 some mutes about him, and bags of bowstrings to 
 strangle men ; but he did not think he was a king so 
 long as a company of fellows were looking into his 
 actions, and examining his ministers as well as his 10 
 accounts." " A king," he thought, " who might be 
 checked, and have his ministers called to an account, 
 was but a king in name." 
 
 In other words Charles had no settled plan of tyranny, 
 but he meant to rule as independently as he could, and 15 
 from the beginning to the end of his reign there never 
 was a moment when he was not doing something to 
 carry out his aim. But he carried it out in a tentative, 
 irregular fashion which it was as hard to detect as to 
 meet. Whenever there was any strong opposition he 20 
 gave way. If popular feeling demanded the dismissal of 
 his ministers, he dismissed them. If it protested against 
 his declaration of religious indulgence, he recalled 
 it. If it cried for victims in the frenzy of the Popish Plot, 
 he gave it victims till the frenzy was at an end. It was 25 
 easy for Charles to yield and to wait, and just as easy 
 for him to take up the thread of his purpose afresh the 
 moment the pressure was over. There was one fixed 
 resolve in fact which overrode every other thought in 
 the King's mind, and this was a resolve " not to set 30 
 out on his travels again." His father had fallen through 
 a quarrel with the two Houses, and Charles was de- 
 
JOHN RICHARD GREEN. 45 
 
 termined to remain on good terms with the Parliament 
 till he was strong enough to pick a quarrel to his profit 
 At no time has party strife raged more fiercely ; in no 
 reign has the temper of the Parliament been more 
 5 threatening to the Crown. But the cynicism of Charles 
 enabled him to ride out storms which would have 
 wrecked a better and a nobler King. He treated the 
 Lords with an easy familiarity which robbed opposition 
 of its seriousness. " Their debates amused him," he 
 
 10 said in his indolent way; and he stood chatting before 
 the fire while peer after peer poured invectives on his 
 ministers, and laughed louder than the rest when 
 Shaftesbury directed his coarsest taunts at the barren- 
 ness of the Queen. Courtiers were entrusted with the 
 
 1 S secret "management" of the Commons; obstinate 
 country gentlemen were brought to the Royal closet to 
 kiss the King's hand and listen to the King's pleasant 
 stories of his escape after Worcester ; and still more 
 obstinate country gentlemen were bribed. Where 
 
 20 bribes, flattery and management failed Charles was 
 content to yield and to wait till his time came again. 
 
IV 
 
 tTbe Ifntevptetation of tbe Constitution. 
 JAMES BRYCE, 1838. 
 
 This selection is the twenty-third chapter of Volume I. of Bryce's 
 * American Commonwealth." This work, first published in 1888, 
 has since passed through several editions and has undergone con- 
 siderable revision. The text here, however, is that of the first 
 edition. 
 
 Like the extract from Huxley, this chapter is notable for the 
 careful division and arrangement of material, and for the illus- 
 trative examples. The latter, however, are here often given in 
 the form of notes. 
 
 THE Constitution of England is contained in hun- 
 dreds of volumes of statutes and reported cases ; the 
 Constitution of the United States (including the amend- 
 ments) may be read through aloud in twenty-three 
 5 minutes. It is about half as long as St. Paul's first 
 Epistle to the Corinthians, and only one-fortieth part 
 as long as the Irish Land Act of 1881. History knows 
 few instruments which in so few words lay down 
 equally momentous rules on a vast range of matters of 
 f othe highest importance and complexity. The Conven- 
 tion of 1787 were well advised in making their draft 
 short, because it was essential that the people should 
 comprehend it, because fresh differences of view would 
 46 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 47 
 
 have emerged the further they had gone into details, 
 and because the more one specifies, the more one has 
 to specify and to attempt the impossible task of pro- 
 viding beforehand for all contingencies. These sages 
 5 were therefore content to lay down a few general rules 
 and principles, leaving some details to be filled in by 
 congressional legislation, and foreseeing that for others 
 it would be necessary to trust to interpretation. 
 
 It is plain that the shorter a law is, the more general 
 
 10 must its language be, and the greater therefore the 
 need for interpretation. So too the greater the range 
 of a law, and the more numerous and serious the cases 
 which it governs, the more frequently will its meaning 
 be canvassed. There have been statutes dealing with 
 
 1 5 private law, such as the Lex Aquilia at Rome and the 
 Statute of Frauds in England, on which many volumes 
 of commentaries have been written, and thousands of 
 juristic and judicial constructions placed. Much more 
 then much we expect to find great public and constitu- 
 
 zotional enactments subjected to the closest sqrutiny in 
 order to discover every shade of meaning which their 
 words can be made to bear. Probably no writing ex- 
 cept the New Testament, the Koran, the Pentateuch, 
 and the Digest of the Emperor Justinian, has employed 
 
 25 so much ingenuity and labor as the American Consti- 
 tution, in sifting, weighing, comparing, illustrating, 
 twisting, and torturing its text. Its resembles theologi- 
 cal writings in this, that both, while taken to be im- 
 mutable guides, have to be adapted to a constantly 
 
 30 changing world, the one to political condition which 
 vary from year to year and never return to their former 
 state, the other to new phases of thought and emotion, 
 
48 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 new beliefs in the realms of physical and ethical phi- 
 losophy. There must, therefore, be a development in 
 constitutional formulas, just as there is in theological. 
 It will come, it cannot be averted, for it comes in virtue 
 of a law of nature : all that men can do is to shut their 5 
 eyes to it, and conceal the reality of change under the 
 continued use of time-honored phrases, trying to per- 
 suade themselves that these phrases mean the same 
 thing to their minds to-day as they meant generations 
 or centuries ago. As a great living theologian says, 10 
 " In a higher world it is otherwise ; but here below to 
 live is to change, and to be perfect is to have changed 
 often." * 
 
 The Constitution of the United States is so concise 
 and so general in its terms, that even had America 15 
 been as slowly moving a country as China, many ques- 
 tions must have arisen on the interpretation of the 
 fundamental law which would have modified its aspect. 
 But America has been the most swiftly expanding of 
 all countries. Hence the questions that have pre-2c 
 sented themselves have often related to matters which 
 the framers of the Constitution could not have con- 
 templated. Wiser than Justinian before them or 
 Napoleon after them, they foresaw that their work 
 would need to be elucidated by judicial commentary. 25 
 But they were far from conjecturing the enormous 
 strain to which some of their expressions would be 
 subjected in the effort to apply them to new facts. 
 
 I must not venture on any general account of the in- 
 terpretation of the Constitution, nor attempt to set 30 
 
 * Newman, " Essay on Development," p, 39. Bryce. 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 49 
 
 forth the rules of construction laid down by judges 
 and commentators, for this is a vast matter and a 
 matter for law books. All that this chapter has to do 
 is to indicate, very generally, in what way and with 
 5 what results the Constitution has been expanded, de- 
 veloped, modified, by interpretation ; and with that 
 view there are three points that chiefly need discussion : 
 (i) the authorities entitled to interpret the Constitu- 
 tion, (2) the main principles followed in determining 
 
 10 whether or no the Constitution has granted, certain 
 powers, (3) the checks on possible abuses of the inter- 
 preting power. 
 
 I. To whom does it belong to interpret the Consti- 
 tution ? Any question arising in a legal proceeding as 
 
 15 to the meaning and application of this fundamental 
 law will evidently be settled by the courts of law. 
 Every court is equally bound to pronounce and com- 
 petent to pronounce on such questions, a State court 
 no less than a Federal court ; but as all the more im- 
 
 2oportant questions are carried by appeal to the supreme 
 Federal court, it is practically that court whose opinion 
 determines them. 
 
 Where the Federal courts have declared the mean- 
 ing of a law, every one ought to accept and guide him- 
 
 25 self by their deliverance. But there are always ques- 
 tions of construction which have not been settled by 
 the courts, some because they have not happened to 
 arise in a lawsuit, others because they are such as can- 
 not arise in a lawsuit. As regards such points, every 
 
 30 authority, Federal or State, as well as every citizen, 
 must be guided by the best view he or they can form 
 of the true intent and meaning of the Constitution, 
 4 
 
50 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 taking, of course, the risk that this view may turn out 
 to be wrong. 
 
 There are also points of construction on which every 
 court, following a well-established practice, will refuse 
 to decide, because they are deemed to be of " a purely 5 
 political nature," a vague description, but one which 
 could be made more specific only by an enumeration 
 of the cases which have settled the practice. These 
 points are accordingly left to the discretion of the ex- 
 ecutive and legislative powers, each of which forms its 10 
 view as to the matters falling within its sphere, and in 
 acting on that view is entitled to the obedience of the 
 citizens and of the States also.* 
 
 It is therefore an error to suppose that the judiciary 
 is the only interpreter of the Constitution, for a large i^ 
 field is left open to the other authorities of the govern- 
 ment, whose views need not coincide, so that a dispute 
 between those authorities, although turning on the 
 meaning of the Constitution, may be incapable of 
 being settled by any legal proceeding. This causes 20 
 no great confusion, because the decision, whether of 
 the political or the judicial authority, is conclusive so 
 far as regards the particular controversy or matter 
 passed upon. 
 
 The above is the doctrine now generally accepted in 25 
 America. But at one time the Presidents claimed the 
 much wider right of being, except in questions of pure 
 private law, generally and prima facie entitled to inter- 
 pret the Constitution for themselves, and to act on 
 their own interpretation, even when it ran counter to 30 
 
 * Assuming, of course, that the matter is one which comes 
 within the range of Federal competence. Bryce. 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 51 
 
 that delivered by the Supreme court. Thus Jefferson 
 denounced the doctrine laid down in the famous judg- 
 ment of Chief-Justice Marshall in the case of Marbury 
 v. Madison ; * thus Jackson insisted that the Supreme 
 5 court was mistaken in holding that Congress had 
 power to charter the United States bank, and that he, 
 knowing better than the court did what the Constitu- 
 tion meant to permit, was entitled to attack the bank 
 as an illegal institution, and to veto a bill proposing to 
 
 10 re-charter it.f Majorities in Congress have more than 
 once claimed for themselves the same independence. 
 But of late years both the executive and the legislature 
 have practically receded from the position which the 
 language formerly used seemed to assert ; while, on 
 
 T 5the other hand, the judiciary, by their tendency during 
 the whole course of their history to support every exer- 
 cise of power which they did not deem plainly uncon- 
 stitutional, have left a wide field to those authorities. 
 
 * As the court dismissed upon another point in the case the 
 .proceedings against Mr. Secretary Madison, the question whether 
 Marshall was right did not arise in a practical form. Bryce. 
 
 f There was, however, nothing unconstitutional in the course 
 which Jackson actually took in withdrawing the deposits from the 
 United States Bank and in vetoing the bill for a re-charter. It is 
 still generally admitted that a President has the right in consider- 
 ing a measure coming to him from Congress to form his own 
 judgment, not only as to its expediency but as to its conforma- 
 bility to the Constitution. Judge Cooley observes to me : " If 
 Jackson sincerely believed that the Constitution had been violated 
 in the first and second charter, he was certainly not bound, when 
 a third was proposed, to surrender his opinion in obedience to 
 precedent. The question of approving a new charter was politi- 
 cal ; and he was entirely within the line of duty in refusing it fol 
 any reasons which, to his own mind, seemed sufficient." Bryce. 
 
52 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 If the latter have not used this freedom to stretch the 
 Constitution even more than they have done, it is not 
 solely the courts of law, but also public opinion and 
 their own professional associations (most presidents, 
 ministers, and congressional leaders having been 5 
 lawyers) that have checked them. 
 
 II. The Constitution has been expanded by con- 
 struction in two ways. Powers have been exercised, 
 sometimes by the President, more often by the legisla- 
 ture, in passing statutes, and the question has arisen 10 
 whether the" powers so exercised were rightfully exer- 
 cised, i. e. were really contained in the Constitution. 
 When the question was resolved in the affirmative by 
 the court, the power has been henceforth recognized 
 as a part of the Constitution, although, of course, 15 
 liable to be subsequently denied by a reversal of the 
 decision which established it. This is one way. The 
 other is where some piece of State legislation alleged 
 to. contravene the Constitution has been judicially de- 
 cided to contravene it, and to be therefore invalid. 20 
 The decision, in narrowing the limits of State authority, 
 tends to widen the prohibitive authority of the Consti- 
 tution, and confirms it in a range and scope of action 
 which was previously doubtful. 
 
 Questions of the above kinds sometimes arise as 25 
 questions of Interpretation in the strict sense of the 
 term, /". e. as questions of the meaning of a term or 
 phrase which is so far ambiguous that it might be 
 taken either to cover or not to cover a case apparently 
 contemplated by the people when they enacted the 30 
 Constitution. Sometimes they are rather questions to 
 which we may apply the name of Construction, /. e. the 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 53 
 
 case that has arisen is one apparently not contemplated 
 by the enacters of the Constitution, or one which, 
 though possibly contemplated, has for brevity's sake 
 been omitted ; but the Constitution has nevertheless 
 
 5 to be applied to its solution. In the former case the 
 enacting power has said something which bears, or is 
 supposed to bear, on the matter, and the point to be 
 determined is, what do the words mean ? In the latter 
 it has not directly referred to the matter, and the ques- 
 
 totionis, Can anything be gathered from its language 
 which covers the point that has arisen, which estab- 
 lishes a principle large enough to reach and include an 
 unmentioned case, indicating what the enacting author- 
 ity would have said had the matter been present to its 
 
 1 5 mind, or had it thought fit to enter on an enumeration 
 of specific instances ? * As the Constitution is not 
 
 * For example, the question whether an agreement carried out 
 between a State and an individual by a legislative act of a State 
 is a " contract " within the meaning of the prohibition against im- 
 pairing the obligation of a contract, is a question of interpretation 
 proper, for it turns on the determination of the meaning of the 
 term " contract." The question whether Congress had power to 
 pass an act emancipating the slaves of persons aiding in a re- 
 bellion was a question of construction, because the case did not 
 directly arise under any provision of the Constitution, and was " 
 apparently not contemplated by the framers thereof. It was a 
 question which had to be solved by considering what the war 
 powers contained in the Constitution might be taken to imply. 
 The question whether the National government has power to 
 issue treasury notes is also a question of construction, because, 
 although this is a case which may possibly have been contem- 
 plated when the Constitution was enacted, it is to be determined 
 by ascertaining whether the power " to borrow money " overs 
 this particular method of borrowing. There is no ambiguity 
 
54 
 
 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 only a well-drafted instrument with few ambiguities 
 but also a short instrument which speaks in very 
 general terms, mere interpretation has been far less 
 difficult than construction. It is through the latter 
 chiefly that the Constitution has been, and still con- 5 
 tinues to be, developed and expanded. The nature of 
 these expansions will appear from the nature of the 
 Federal government. It is a government of delegated 
 and specified powers. The people have entrusted to 
 it, not the plenitude of their own authority but certain 10 
 enumerated functions, and its lawful action is limited 
 to these functions. Hence, when the Federal execu- 
 tive does an act, or the Federal legislature passes a 
 law, the question arises Is the power to do this act 
 or pass this law one of the powers which the people 15 
 have by the Constitution delegated to their agents ? 
 The power may never have been exerted before. It 
 may not be found expressed, in so many words, in the 
 Constitution. Nevertheless it may, upon the true con- 
 struction of that instrument, taking one clause with 20 
 another, be held to be therein contained. 
 
 Now the doctrines laid down by Chief-Justice Mar- 
 shall, and on which the courts have constantly since 
 proceeded, may be summed up in two propositions. 
 
 i. Every power alleged to be vested in the National 25 
 government, or any organ thereof, must be affirmatively 
 shown to have been granted. There is no presump- 
 
 about the word " borrow "; the difficulty is to pronounce which 
 out of various methods of borrowing, some of which probably 
 were contemplated, can be properly deemed, on a review of the 
 whole financial attributes and functions of the National govern- 
 ment, to be included within the borrowing power. Bryce. 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 55 
 
 tion in favor of the existence of a power ; on the con- 
 trary, the burden of proof lies on those who assert its 
 existence, to point out something in the Constitution 
 which, either expressly or by necessary implication, 
 5 confers it. Just as an agent, claiming to act on behalf 
 of his principal, must make out by positive evidence 
 that his principal gave him the authority he relies on ; 
 so Congress, or those who rely on one of its statutes, 
 are bound to show that the people have authorized the 
 
 10 legislature to pass the statute. . The search for the 
 power will be conducted in a spirit of strict exactitude, 
 and if there be found in the Constitution nothing 
 which directly or impliedly conveys it, then whatever 
 the executive or legislature of the National govern- 
 
 15 ment, or both of them together, may have done in the 
 persuasion of its existence, must be deemed null and 
 void, like the act of any other unauthorized agent.* 
 
 2. When once the grant of a power by the people to 
 the National government has been established, that 
 
 20 power will be construed broadly. The strictness ap- 
 plied in determining its existence gives place to liber- 
 ality in supporting its application. The people so 
 
 * For instance, several years ago a person summoned as a wit- 
 ness before a committee of the House of Representatives was 
 imprisoned by order of the House for refusing to answer certain 
 questions put to him. He sued the sergeant-at-arms for false 
 imprisonment, and recovered damages, the Supreme court holding 
 that as the Constitution could not be shown to have conferred 
 on either House of Congress any power to punish for contempt, 
 that power (though frequently theretofore exercised) did not ex- 
 ist, and the order of the House therefore constituted no defence 
 for the sergeant's act (Kilbourn v. Thompson, 103 United States, 
 168). Brycc. 
 
56 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 Marshall and his successors have argued when they 
 confer a power, must be deemed to confer a wide dis- 
 cretion as to the means whereby it is to be used in 
 their service. For their main object is that it should 
 be used vigorously and wisely, which it cannot be if the 5 
 choice of methods is narrowly restricted ; and while 
 the people may well be chary in delegating powers to 
 their agents, they must be presumed, when they do 
 grant these powers, to grant them with confidence in 
 the agents' judgment, allowing all that freedom in using ic 
 one means or another to attain the desired end which 
 is needed to ensure success.^ This, which would in 
 any case be the common-sense view, is fortified by the 
 language of the Constitution, which authorizes Con- 
 gress "to make all laws which shall be necessary and 15 
 proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, 
 and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the 
 Government of the United States, or in any depart- 
 ment or office thereof." The sovereignty of the Na- 
 tional government, therefore, u though limited to speci- 20 
 fied objects, is plenary as to those objects " and 
 supreme in its sphere. Congress, which cannot go one 
 step beyond the circle of action which the Constitution 
 has traced for it, may within that circle choose any 
 means which it deems apt for executing its powers, 25 
 and is in its choice of means subject to no review by 
 the courts in their functions of interpreters, because 
 
 * For instance, Congress having power to declare war, has 
 power to prosecute it by all means necessary for success, and to 
 acquire territory either by conquest or treaty. Having power to 
 borrow money, Congress may, if it thinks fit, issue treasury notes, 
 and may make them legal tender. Bryce* 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 57 
 
 the people have made their representatives the sole 
 and absolute judges of the mode in which the granted 
 powers shall be employed. This doctrine of implied 
 powers, and the interpretation of the words " necessary 
 5 and proper/' were for many years a theme of bitter 
 and incessant controversy among American lawyers 
 and publicists.* The history of the United States is 
 
 * " The powers of the government are limited, and its limits are 
 not to be transcended. But the sound construction of the Consti- 
 tution must allow to the national legislature that discretion with 
 respect to the means by which the powers it confers are to be 
 carried into execution, which will enable that body to perform 
 the high duties assigned to it in the manner most beneficial to the 
 people. Let the end be legitimate, let it be within the scope of 
 the Constitution, and all means which are appropriate, which are 
 plainly adapted to that end, which are not prohibited but con- 
 sistent with the letter and spirit of the Constitution, are constitu- 
 tional." Marshall, C.-J., in M'Culloch v. Maryland (4 Wheat. 
 316). This is really a working-out of one of the points of Hamil- 
 ton's famous argument in favor of the constitutionality of a 
 United States bank : " Every power vested in a government is in 
 its nature sovereign, and includes by force of the term a right to 
 employ all the means requisite and fairly applicable to the attain- 
 ment of the ends of such power, and which are not precluded by 
 restrictions and exceptions specified in the Constitution." 
 "Works" (Lodge's ed.), vol. iii. p. 181. 
 
 Judge Hare sums up the matter by saying, " Congress is 
 sovereign as regards the objects and within the limits of the 
 Constitution. It may use all proper and suitable means for carry- 
 ing the powers conferred by the Constitution into effect. The 
 means best suited at one time may be inadequate at another ; 
 hence the need for vesting a large discretion in Congress. . . . 
 ' Necessary and proper ' are therefore, as regards legislation, 
 nearly if not quite synonymous, that being 'necessary ' which is 
 suited to the object and calculated to attain the end in view." 
 " Lectures on Constitutional Law," p. 78. Bryce, 
 
58 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 in a large measure a history of the arguments which 
 sought -to enlarge or restrict its import. One school of 
 statesmen urged that a lax construction would prac- 
 tically leave the States at the mercy of the National 
 government, and remove those checks on the latter 5 
 which the Constitution was designed to create ; while 
 the very fact that some powers were specifically 
 granted must be taken to import that those not 
 specified were withheld, according to the old maxim 
 expressio unius exclusio alterius, which Lord Bacon con- ic 
 cisely explains by saying, " as exception strengthens 
 the force of a law in cases not excepted, so enumera- 
 tion weakens it in cases not enumerated." It was 
 replied by the opposite school that to limit the powers 
 of the government to those expressly set forth in the 15 
 Constitution would render that instrument unfit to serve 
 the purposes of a growing and changing nation, and 
 would, by leaving men no legal means of attaining 
 necessary but originally uncontemplated aims, provoke 
 revolution and work the destruction of the Constitu- 20 
 tion itself.* 
 
 This latter contention derived much support from 
 the fact that there were certain powers that had not 
 been mentioned in the Constitution, but which were 
 so obviously incident to a national government that 23 
 they must be deemed to be raised by implication. f 
 
 * See the philosophical remarks of Story, J., in Martin v. 
 Hunter 1 s Lessee (i Wheat, p. 304 sqq.) Bryce. 
 
 t Stress was also laid on the fact that whereas the Articles of 
 Confederation of 1781 contained (Art. ii.) the expression, " Each 
 State retains every power and jurisdiction and right not expressly 
 delegated to the United States in Congress assembled," th? 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 59 
 
 For instance, the only offences which Congress is ex. 
 pressly empowered to punish are treason, the counter- 
 feiting of the coin or securities of the government, and 
 piracies and other offences against the law of nations. 
 5 But it was very early held that the power to declare 
 other acts to be offences against the United States, 
 and punish them as such, existed as a necessary ap- 
 pendage to various general powers. So the power to 
 regulate commerce covered the power to punish offences 
 
 to obstructing commerce ; the power to manage the post- 
 office included the right to fix penalties on the theft of 
 letters ; and, in fact, a whole mass of criminal law grew 
 up as a sanction to the civil laws which Congress had 
 been directed to pass. 
 
 15 The three lines along which this development of the 
 implied powers of the government has chiefly pro- 
 gressed, have been those marked out by the three 
 express powers of taxing and borrowing money, of 
 regulating commerce, and of carrying on war. Each 
 
 20 has produced a progeny of subsidiary powers, some of 
 which have in their turn been surrounded by an unex- 
 pected offspring. Thus from the taxing and borrowing 
 powers there sprang the powers to charter a national 
 bank and exempt its branches and its notes from taxa- 
 
 *5 tion by a State (a serious restriction on State authority), 
 to create a system of custom-houses and revenue cut- 
 ters, to establish a tariff for the protection of native 
 industry. Thus the regulation of commerce has been 
 
 Constitution merely says (Amendment x.), "The powers 
 not granted to the United States are reserved to the States 
 respectively or to the people," omitting the word " expressly." 
 Bryce. 
 
60 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 construed to include legislation regarding every kind 
 of transportation of goods and passengers, whether 
 from abroad or from one State to another, regarding 
 navigation, maritime and internal pilotage, maritime 
 contracts, etc., together with the control of all navigable 5 
 waters,* the construction of all public works helpful to 
 commerce between States or with foreign countries, 
 the power to prohibit immigration, and finally a power 
 to establish a railway commission and control all inter- 
 State traffic.f The war power proved itself even more 10 
 elastic. The executive and the majority in Congress 
 found themselves during the War of Secession obliged 
 to stretch this power to cover many acts trenching on 
 the ordinary rights of the States and of individuals, 
 till there ensued something approaching a suspension 15 
 
 * Navigable rivers and lakes wholly within the limits of a State, 
 and not accessible from without it, are under the authority of 
 that State. Bryce. 
 
 \ The case of Gibbons v. Ogden supplies an interesting illustra- 
 tion of the way in which this doctrine of implied powers works 
 itself out. The State of New York had, in order to reward 
 Fulton and Livingston for their services in introducing steam- 
 boats, passed a statute giving them an exclusive right of naviga- 
 ting the Hudson river with steamers. A case having arisen in 
 which this statute was invoked, it was alleged that the statute 
 was invalid, because inconsistent with an Act passed by Congress. 
 The question followed, Was Congress entitled to pass an Act 
 dealing with the navigation of the Hudson ? and it was held that 
 the power to regulate commerce granted to Congress by the 
 Constitution implied a power to legislate for navigation on such 
 rivers as the Hudson, and that Congress having exercised that 
 power, the action of the States on the subject was necessarily 
 excluded. By this decision a vast field of legislation was secured 
 to Congress and closed to the States. Bryce. 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 61 
 
 of constitutional guarantees in favor of the central 
 government. 
 
 The courts have occasionally gone even further 
 afield, and have professed to deduce certain powers of 
 5 the legislature from the sovereignty inherent in the 
 National government. In its last decision on the legal 
 tender question, a majority of the Supreme court seems 
 to have placed upon this ground, though with special 
 reference to the section enabling Congress to borrow 
 
 10 money, its affirmance of that competence of Congress 
 to declare paper money a legal tender for debts, which 
 the earlier decision of 1871 had referred to the war 
 power. This position evoked a controversy of wide 
 scope, for the question what sovereignty involves is 
 
 15 evidently at least as much a question of political as of 
 legal science, and may be pushed to great lengths upon 
 considerations with which law proper has little to do. 
 
 The above-mentioned instances of development have 
 been worked out by the courts of law. But others are 
 
 20 due to the action of the executive, or of the executive 
 arid Congress conjointly. Thus, in 1803, President 
 Jefferson negotiated and completed the purchase of 
 Louisiana, the whole vast possessions of France be- 
 yond the Mississippi. He believed himself to be ex- 
 
 25 ceeding any powers which the Constitution conferred , 
 and desired to have an amendment to it passed, in 
 order to validate his act. But Congress and the people 
 did not share his scruples, and the approval of the 
 legislature was deemed sufficient ratification for a step 
 
 30 of transcendent importance, which no provision of the 
 Constitution bore upon. In 1807 and 1808 Congress 
 laid, by two statutes, an embargo on all shipping in 
 
62 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 United States ports, thereby practically destroying the 
 lucrative carrying trade of the New England -States. 
 Some of these States declared the Act unconstitutional, 
 arguing that a power to regulate commerce was not a 
 power to annihilate it, and their courts held it to be 5 
 void. Congress, however, persisted for a year, and 
 the Act, on which the Supreme court never formally 
 pronounced, has been generally deemed within the 
 Constitution, though Justice Story (who had warmly 
 opposed it when he sat in Congress) remarks that it ic 
 went to the extreme verge. More startling, and more 
 far-reaching in their consequences, were the assump- 
 tions of Federal authority made during the War of Se- 
 cession by the executive and confirmed, some expressly, 
 some tacitly, by Congress and the people.* It was ic 
 only a few of these that came before the courts, and 
 the courts, in some instances, disapproved them. But 
 the executive continued to exert this extraordinary 
 
 * See Judge Cooley's " History of Michigan," p. 353. The same 
 eminent authority observes to me : " The President suspended 
 the writ of habeas corpus. The courts held this action uncon- 
 stitutional (it was subsequently confirmed by Congress), but he 
 did not at once deem it safe to obey their judgment. Military 
 commissioners, with the approval of the War Department and 
 the President, condemned men to punishment for treason, but 
 the courts released them, holding that the guaranties of liberty in 
 the Constitution were as obligatory in war as in peace, and should 
 be obeyed by all citizens, and all departments, and officers of 
 government (Milligarfs case, 4 Wall. i). The courts held closely 
 to the Constitution, but as happens in every civil war, a great 
 many wrongs were done in the exercise of the war power for 
 which no redress, or none that was adequate, could possibly be 
 had." Inter arma silent leges must be always to some extent true, 
 even under a Constitution like that of the United States. Bryce< 
 
JAMES BRYCR. 63 
 
 authority. Appeals made to the letter of the Constitu- 
 tion by the minority were discredited by the fact that 
 they were made by persons sympathizing with the 
 Secessionists who were seeking to destroy it. So many 
 5 extreme things were done under the pressure of neces- 
 sity that something less than these extreme things came 
 to be accepted as a reasonable and moderate com- 
 promise.* 
 
 The best way to give an adequate notion of the 
 
 10 extent to which the outlines of the Constitution have 
 been filled up by interpretation and construction, 
 would be to take some of its more important sections 
 and enumerate the decisions upon them and the doc- 
 trines established by those decisions. This process 
 
 1 5 would, however, be irksome to any but a legal reader, 
 and the legal reader may do it more agreeably for him- 
 self by consulting one of the annotated editions of the 
 Constitution. f He will there find that upon some pro- 
 visions such as Art. i. 8 (powers of Congress), Art. i. 
 
 20 10 (powers denied to the States), Art. iii. 2 (extent 
 of judicial power), there has sprung up a perfect forest 
 of judicial constructions, working out the meaning and 
 application of the few and apparently simple words of 
 the original document into a variety of unforeseen 
 
 25 results. The same thing has more or less befallen 
 
 * Such as the suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, the 
 emancipation of the slaves of persons aiding in the rebellion, the 
 suspension of the statute of limitations, the practical extinction 
 of State Banks by increased taxation laid on them under the 
 general taxing power. Bryce. 
 
 t Such as Desty's clear and compendious " Federal Constitu- 
 tion Annotated." Bryce. 
 
64 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 nearly every section of the Constitution and of the 
 fifteen amendments. The process shows no signs of 
 stopping, nor can it, for the new conditions of econo- 
 mics and politics bring up new problems for solution. 
 But the most important work was that done during the 5 
 first half century, and especially by Chief-Justice Mar- 
 shall during his long tenure of the presidency of the 
 Supreme court (1801-1835). ^ t * s scarcely an exag- 
 eration to call him, as an eminent American jurist has 
 done, a second maker of the Constitution. I will not 10 
 borrow the phrase which said of Augustus that he 
 found Rome of brick and left it of marble, because 
 Marshall's function was not to change but to develop. 
 The Constitution was, except of course as regards the 
 political scheme of national government, which was 15 
 already well established, rather a ground plan than a 
 city. It was, if I may pursue the metaphor, much what 
 the site of Washington was at the beginning of this 
 century, a symmetrical ground plan for a great city, 
 but with only some tall edifices standing here and there 20 
 among fields and woods. Marshall left it what Wash- 
 ington has now become, a splendid and commodious 
 capital within whose ample bounds there are still some 
 vacant spaces and some mean dwellings, but which, 
 built up and beautified as it has been by the taste and 25 
 wealth of its rapidly growing population, is worthy to 
 be the centre of a mighty nation. Marshall was, of 
 course, only one among seven judges, but his majestic 
 Intellect and the elevation of his character gave him 
 such an ascendency, that he found himself only once 3^ 
 in a minority on any constitutional question.* His 
 
 * In that one case (Ogden v. Sanders) there was a bare majority 
 
fAMES BRYCE. 65 
 
 work of building up and working out the Constitution 
 was accomplished not so much by the decisions he 
 gave as by the judgments in which he expounded the 
 principles of these decisions, judgments which for their 
 
 5 philosophical breadth, the luminous exactness of their 
 reasoning, and the fine political sense which pervades 
 them, have never been surpassed and rarely equalled 
 by the most famous jurists of modern Europe or of 
 ancient Rome. Marshall did not forget the duty of a 
 
 10 judge to decide nothing more than the suit before him 
 requires, but he was wont to set forth the grounds of 
 his decision in such a way as to show how they would 
 fall to be applied in cases that had not yet arisen. He 
 grasped with extraordinary force and clearness the car- 
 
 15 dinal idea that the creation of a national government 
 implies the grant of all such subsidiary powers as are 
 requisite to the effectuation of its main powers and 
 purposes, but he developed and applied this idea with 
 so much prudence and sobriety, never treading on 
 
 20 purely political ground, never indulging the temptation 
 to theorize, but content to follow out as a lawyer the 
 consequences of legal- principles, that the Constitution 
 seemed not so much to rise under his hands to its full 
 stature, as to be gradually unveiled by him till it stood 
 
 25 revealed in the harmonious perfection of the form 
 which its framers had designed. That admirable flexi- 
 
 against him, and professional opinion now approves the view 
 which he took. See an extremely interesting address delivered 
 to the American Bar Association in 1879 by Mr- Edward J. Phelps, 
 who observes that when Marshall became Chief-Justice only two 
 decisions on constitutional law had been pronounced by the 
 court. Between that time and his death fifty-one were given. 
 Bryce. 
 
 5 
 
66 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 bility and capacity for growth which characterize it 
 beyond all other rigid or supreme constitutions, is 
 largely due to him, yet not more to his courage than to 
 his caution. 
 
 We now come to the third question : How is the 5 
 interpreting authority restrained ? If the American 
 Constitution is capable of being so developed by this 
 expansive interpretation, what security do its written 
 terms offer to the people and to the States ? What 
 becomes of the special value claimed for Rigid consti- 10 
 tutions that they preserve the frame of government un- 
 impaired in its essential merits, that they restrain the 
 excesses of a transient majority, and (in Federations) 
 the aggressions of a central authority ? 
 
 The answer is two-fold. In the first place, the inter- 15 
 preting authority is, in questions not distinctly political, 
 different from the legislature and from the executive. 
 There is therefore a probability that it will disagree 
 with either of them when they attempt to transgress 
 the Constitution, and will decline to stretch the law so 20 
 as to sanction encroachments those authorities may 
 have attempted. The fact that the interpreting author- 
 ity is nowise amenable to the other two, and is com- 
 posed of lawyers, imbued with professional habits, 
 strengthens this probability. In point of fact, there 25 
 have been few cases, and those chiefly cases of urgency 
 during the war, in which the judiciary has been even 
 accused of lending itself to the designs of the other 
 organs of government. The period when extensive in- 
 terpretation was most active (1800-1835) was also the 30 
 period when the party opposed to a strong central 
 government commanded Congress and the executive. 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 67 
 
 and so far from approving the course the court took, 
 the dominant party then often complained of it. 
 
 In the second place, there stands above and behind 
 the legislature, the executive, and the judiciary, an- 
 
 5 other power, that of public opinion. The President, 
 Congress, and the courts are all, the two former directly, 
 the latter practically, amenable to the people, and 
 anxious to be in harmony with the general current of 
 its sentiment. If the people approve the way in which 
 
 ro these authorities are interpreting and using the* Con* 
 stitution, they go on ; if the people disapprove, they 
 pause, or at least slacken their pace. Generally the 
 people have approved of such action by the President 
 cr Congress as has seemed justified by the needs of 
 
 '5 the time, even though it may have gone beyond the 
 letter of the Constitution : generally they have ap- 
 proved the conduct of the courts whose legal interpre- 
 tation has upheld such legislative or executive action. 
 Public opinion sanctioned the purchase of Louisiana, 
 
 20 and the still bolder action of the executive in the Seces- 
 sion War. It approved the Missouri compromise of 
 1820, which the Supreme court thirty-seven years after- 
 wards declared to have been in excess of the powers of 
 Congress. But it disapproved the Alien and Sedition 
 
 25 laws of 1798, and although these statutes were never 
 pronounced unconstitutional by the courts, this popular 
 censure has prevented any similar legislation since that 
 time.* The people have, of course, much less exact 
 notions of the Constitution than the legal profession or 
 
 * So it disapproved strongly, in the northern States, of the 
 judgments delivered by the majority of the Supreme court in the 
 Dred Scott case. Brycc* 
 
68 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 the courts. But while they generally desire to see the 
 powers of the government so far expanded as to enable 
 it to meet the exigencies of the moment, they are suffi- 
 ciently attached to its general doctrines, they suffi- 
 ciently prize the protection it affords them against S 
 their own impulses, to censure any interpretation which 
 palpably departs from the old lines. And their censure 
 is, of course, still more severe if the court seems to be 
 acting at the bidding of a party. 
 
 A singular result of the importance of constitutional 10 
 interpretation in the American government may be 
 here referred to. It is this, x that the United States 
 legislature has been very largely occupied in purely 
 legal discussions. When it is proposed to legislate on 
 a subject which has been heretofore little dealt with, 15 
 the opponents of a measure have two lines of defence. 
 They may, as Englishmen would in a like case, argue 
 that the measure is inexpedient. But they may also, 
 which Englishmen cannot, argue that it is unconstitu- 
 tional, /. e. illegal, because transcending the powers of 20 
 Congress. This is a question fit to be raised in Con- 
 gress, not only as regards matters with which, as being 
 purely political, the courts of law will refuse to inter- 
 fere, but as regards all other matters also, because 
 since a decision on the constitutionality of a statute 25 
 can never be obtained from the judges by anticipation, 
 the legislature ought to consider whether they are act- 
 ing within their competence. And it is a question on 
 which a stronger case can often be made, and made 
 with less exertion, than on the issue whether the 30 
 measure be substantially expedient. Hence it is usu- 
 ally put in the fore-front of the battle, and argued with 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 69 
 
 great vigor and acumen by leaders who are probably 
 more ingenious as lawyers than they are far-sighted as 
 statesmen. 
 
 A further consequence of this habit is pointed out 
 5 by one of the most thoughtful among American con- 
 stitutional writers. Legal issues are apt to dwarf and 
 obscure the more substantially important issues of 
 principle and policy, distracting from these latter the 
 attention of the nation as well as the skill of congres- 
 
 10 sional debaters. 
 
 " The English legislature," says Judge Hare, " is free 
 to follow any course that will promote the welfare of 
 the State, and the inquiry is not, ' Has Parliament 
 power to pass the Act?' but, ' Is it consistent with 
 
 1 5 principle, and such as the circumstances demand?' 
 These are the material points, and if the public mind 
 is satisfied as to them there is no further controversy. 
 In the United States, on the other hand, the question 
 primarily is one of power, and in the refined and subtle 
 
 20 discussion which ensues, right is too often lost sight of 
 or treated as if it were synonymous with might. It is 
 taken for granted that what the Constitution permits 
 it also approves, and that measures which are legal 
 cannot be contrary to morals." * 
 
 25 The interpretation of the Constitution has at times 
 become so momentous as to furnish a basis for the 
 formation of political parties ; and the existence of 
 parties divided upon such questions has of course 
 stimulated the interest with which points of legal inter- 
 
 3opretation have been watched and canvassed. Soon 
 after the formation of the National government in 1789 
 * " Lectures on Constitutional Law," p. 135. Brycc* 
 
;o INTERPRETATION- OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 two parties grew up, one advocating a strong central 
 authority, the other championing the rights of the 
 States. Of these parties the former naturally came to 
 insist on a liberal, an expansive, perhaps a lax con- 
 struction of the words of the Constitution, because the 5 
 more wide is the meaning placed upon its grant of 
 powers, so much the wider are those powers themselves 
 The latter party, on the other hand, was acting in pro- 
 tection both of the States and of the individual citizen 
 against the central government, when it limited by a ia 
 strict and narrow interpretation of the fundamental 
 instrument the powers which that instrument conveyed. 
 The distinction which began in those early days has 
 never since vanished. There has always been a party 
 professing itself disposed to favor the central govern- 15 
 ment, and therefore a party of broad construction. 
 There has always been a party claiming that it aimed 
 at protecting the rights of the States, and therefore a 
 party of strict construction. Some writers have gone 
 so far as to deem these different views of interpreta-2o 
 tion to be the foundation of all the political parties 
 that have divided America. This view, however, in- 
 verts the facts. It is not because men have differed in 
 their reading of the Constitution that they have advo- 
 cated or opposed an extension of Federal powers ; it 25 
 is their attitude on this substantial issue that has de- 
 termined their attitude on the verbal one. Moreover, 
 the two great parties have several times changed sides 
 on the very question of interpretation. The purchase 
 of Louisiana and the Embargo acts were the work of 30 
 the Strict Constructionists, while it was the Loose 
 Constructionist party which protested against the latter 
 
JAMES BRYCE. 7! 
 
 measure, and which, at the Hartford Convention of 
 1814, advanced doctrines of State rights almost amount 
 ing to those subsequently asserted by South Carolina 
 in 1832 and by the Secessionists of 1861. Parties in 
 5 America, as in most countries, have followed their 
 temporary interest ; and if that interest happened to 
 differ from some traditional party doctrine, they have 
 explained the latter away. Whenever there has been 
 a serious party conflict, it has been in reality a conflict 
 
 ro over some living and practical issue, and only in form 
 a debate upon canons of legal interpretation. What 
 is remarkable, though natural enough in a country 
 governed by a written instrument, is that every con- 
 troversy has got involved with questions of constitu- 
 
 iStional construction. When it was proposed to exert 
 some power of Congress, as for instance to charter a 
 national bank, to grant money for internal improve- 
 ments, to enact a protective tariff, the opponents of 
 these schemes could plausibly argue, and therefore of 
 
 20 course did argue, that they were unconstitutional. So 
 any suggested interference with slavery in States or 
 Territories was immediately declared to violate the 
 State rights which the Constitution guaranteed. Thus 
 every serious question came to be fought as a constitu 
 
 25 tional question. But as regards most questions, and 
 certainly as regards the great majority of the party 
 combatants, men did not attack or defend a proposal 
 because they held it legally unsound or sound on the 
 true construction of the Constitution, but alleged it to 
 
 30 be constitutionally wrong or right because they thought 
 the welfare of the country, or at least their party in- 
 terests, to be involved. Constitutional interpretation 
 
72 INTERPRETATION OF THE CONSTITUTION. 
 
 was a pretext rather than a cause, a matter of form 
 rather than of substance. 
 
 The results were both good and evil. They were 
 good in so far as they made both parties profess them- 
 selves defenders of the Constitution, zealous only that 5 
 it should be interpreted aright ; as they familiarized the 
 people with its provisions, and made them vigilant 
 critics of every legislative or executive act which could 
 affect its working. They were evil in distracting public 
 attention from real problems to the legal aspect of those ia 
 problems, and in cultivating a habit of casuistry which 
 threatened the integrity of the Constitution itself. 
 
 Since the Civil War there has been much less of this 
 casuistry because there have been fewer occasions for 
 it, the Broad Construction view of the Constitution 15 
 having practically prevailed prevailed so far that the 
 Supreme court now holds that the power of Congress 
 to make paper money legal tender is incident to the 
 sovereignty of the National government, and that a 
 Democratic House of Representatives passes a bill giv- 20 
 ing a Federal commission vast powers over all the rail- 
 ways which pass through more than one State. There 
 is still a party inclined to strict construction, but the 
 strictness which it upholds would have been deemed 
 lax by the Broad Constructionists of thirty years ago. 25 
 The interpretation which has thus stretched the Con- 
 stitution to cover powers once undreamt of, may be 
 deemed a dangerous resource. But it must be remem- 
 bered that even the constitutions we call rigid must 
 make their choice between being bent or being broken. 30 
 The Americans have more than once bent their Consti- 
 tution in order that they might not be forced to break it. 
 
V. 
 
 TTbe <5taeco=s1Ftalfan Stocft* 
 
 CHRISTIAN MATTHIAS THEODOR MOMM 
 
 SEN, 1817. 
 
 This discussion of the knowledge of the Graeco-Italian stock 
 gained from a study of philology is from the second chapter of 
 the first book of Mommsen's " History of Rome," published 
 in German in 1853. The text is from the English edition of 1869, 
 translated from the fourth German edition by the Rev. William 
 P. Dickson, of Glasgow. 
 
 DURING the period when the Indo-Germanic nations, 
 which are now separated, still formed one stock, speak- 
 ing the same language, they attained a certain stage of 
 culture, and they had a vocabulary corresponding to it. 
 
 5 This vocabulary the several nations carried along with 
 them, in its conventionally established use, as a com- 
 mon dowry and a foundation for further structures of 
 their own. In it we find not merely the simplest terms 
 denoting existence, actions, perceptions, such as sum, 
 
 10 do, pater, the original echo of the impression which the 
 external world made on the mind of man, but also a 
 number of words indicative of culture (not only as re- 
 spects their roots, but in a form stamped upon them by 
 custom), which are the common property of the Indo- 
 
 *5 Germanic family, and which cannot be explained either 
 
 73 
 
;4 THE GRAECO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 upon the principle of a uniform development in the sev- 
 eral languages, or on the supposition of their having 
 subsequently borrowed one from another. In this way 
 we possess evidence of the development of pastoral life 
 at that remote epoch in the unalterably fixed names of 5 
 domestic animals ; the Sanscrit gaus is the Latin bos, 
 the Greek /3oOs ; Sanscrit avis is the Latin ovis, Greek 
 fas ; Sanscrit a$vas, Latin equus, Greek I'TTTTOS ; Sanscrit 
 hansas, Latin anser, Greek xfy ; Sanscrit atis, Latin 
 anas, Greek yrjo-o-a ; in like manner, pecus, sus, porcus, ia 
 taurus, canis, are Sanscrit words. Even at this remote 
 period, accordingly, the stock on which, from the days 
 of Homer down to our own time, the intellectual devel- 
 ment of mankind has been dependent, had already 
 advanced beyond the lowest stage of civilization, the 15 
 hunting and fishing epoch, and had attained at least 
 comparative fixity of abode. On the other hand, we 
 have as yet no certain proofs of the existence of agri- 
 culture at this period. Language rather favors the 
 negative view. Of the Latin-Greek names of grain, 20 
 none occur in Sanscrit, with the single exception of 
 fed, which philologically represents the Sanscritj/#zw, 
 but denotes in the Indian barley, in Greek spelt. It 
 must indeed be granted that this diversity in the names 
 of cultivated plants, which so strongly contrasts with 25 
 the essential agreement in the appellations of domestic 
 animals, does not absolutely preclude the supposition 
 of a common original agriculture. In the circumstances 
 of primitive times, transport and acclimatizing are more 
 difficult in the case of plants than of animals ; and the 30 
 cultivation of rice among the Indians, that of wheat 
 and spelt among the Greeks and Romans, and that of 
 
MOMMSEN. 75 
 
 rye and oats among the Germans and Celts, may all be 
 traceable to a common system of primitive tillage. On 
 the other hand, the name of one cereal common to the 
 Greeks and Indians only proves, at the most, that be- 
 5 fore the separation of the stocks they gathered and ate 
 the grains of barley and spelt growing wild in Meso- 
 potamia, not that they already cultivated grain. While, 
 however, we reach no decisive result in this way, a fur- 
 ther light is thrown on the subject by our observing 
 
 10 that a number of the most important words bearing on 
 this province of culture occur certainly in Sanscrit, but 
 all of them in a more general signification. Agras 
 among the Indians denotes a level surface in general ; 
 kfirnu, anything pounded ; aritram, oar and ship ; 
 
 i$venas, that which is pleasant in general, particularly a 
 pleasant drink. The words are thus very ancient ; but 
 their more definite application to the field (ager), to the 
 grain to be ground (granum), to the implement which 
 furrows the soil as the ship furrows the surface of the 
 
 20 sea (aratrum), to the juice of the grape (vinum), had 
 not yet taken place when the earliest division of the 
 stocks occurred, and it is not to be wondered at that 
 their subsequent applications came to be in some in- 
 stances very different, and that, for example, the corn 
 
 25 intended to be ground, as well as the mill for grinding 
 it (Gothic quairnus, Lithuanian girnbs), received their 
 names from the Sanscrit kfirnu. We may accordingly 
 assume it as probable, that the primeval Indo-Ger- 
 inanic people were not yet acquainted with agriculture, 
 
 30 and as certain that, if they were so, it played but a 
 very subordinate part in their economy ; for, had it at 
 that time held the place which it afterwards held among 
 
76 THE GR^CO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 the Greeks and Romans, it would have left a deeper 
 impression upon the language. 
 
 On the other hand, the building of houses and huts 
 by the Indo-Germans is attested by the Sanscrit 
 dam(as\ Latin domus, Greek 56/xos ; Sanscrit vfyas, Latin 5 
 vicus, Greek oT/cos ; Sanscrit dvaras, Latin fores, Greek 
 6tpa ; further, the building of oar-boats by the names of 
 the boat Sanscrit naus, Latin navis, Greek vavs ; and of 
 the oar, Sanscrit aritram, Greek eper^s, Latin remus, 
 tri-res-mis ; and the use of wagons and the breaking in 10 
 of animals for draught and transport by the Sanscrit 
 akshas (axle and cart), Latin axis, Greek &&v, &fjL-afr 
 Sanscrit iugam, Latin iugum, Greek frybv. The words 
 signifying clothing Sanscrit vastra, Latin vestis, Greek 
 Mfc ; and sewing Sanscrit siv, Latin suo ; Sanscrit 15 
 nah, Latin neo, Greek ^0o>, are alike in all Indo-Ger- 
 manic languages. This cannot, however, be equally 
 affirmed of the higher art of weaving. The knowledge 
 of the use of fire in preparing food, and of salt for sea- 
 soning it, is a primeval heritage of the Indo-Germanic 20 
 nations ; and the same may be affirmed regarding the 
 knowledge of the earliest metals employed as imple- 
 ments or ornaments by man. At least, the names of 
 copper (as) and silver (argentum), perhaps also of gold, 
 are met with in Sanscrit, and these names can scarcely 25 
 have originated before man had learned to separate and 
 to utilize the ores ; the Sanscrit asis, Latin ensis, points, 
 in fact, to the primeval use of metallic weapons. 
 
 No less do we find extending back into those times 
 the fundamental ideas on which the development of 30 
 all Indo-Germanic states ultimately rests the relative 
 position of husband and wife, the arrangement in clans, 
 
MOMMSEN. 
 
 77 
 
 the priesthood of the father of the household, and the 
 absence of a special sacerdotal class, as well as of all dis- 
 tinctions of caste in general, slavery as a legitimate insti- 
 tution, the days of publicly dispensing justice at the 
 5 new and full moon. On the other hand, the positive or- 
 ganization of the body politic, the decision of the ques- 
 tions between regal sovereignty and the sovereignty of 
 the community, between the hereditary privilege of 
 royal and noble houses and the unconditional legal 
 
 10 equality of the citizens belong altogether to a later age. 
 
 Even the elements of science and religion show traces 
 
 of a community of origin. The numbers are the same 
 
 up to one hundred (Sanscrit {atam, ka$atam, Latin 
 
 centum, Greek e-/car6^ Gothic hund) ; and the moon re- 
 
 15 ceives her name in all languages from the fact that men 
 measure time by her (mensis). The idea of Deity itself 
 (Sanscrit devas, Latin deus, Greek 0e6s), and many of the 
 oldest conceptions of religion and of natural symbol- 
 ism, belong to the common inheritance of the nations. 
 
 20 The conception, for example, of heaven as the father, 
 and of earth as the mother of being, the festal expedi- 
 tions of the gods, who proceed from place to place in 
 their own chariots along carefully levelled paths, the 
 shadowy continuation of the soul's existence after 
 
 25 death, are fundamental ideas of the Indian as well as 
 of the Greek and Roman mythologies. Several of the 
 gods of the Ganges coincide even in name with those 
 worshipped on the Ilissus and the Tiber : thus the 
 Uranus of the Greeks is the Varunas, their Zeus, Jovis 
 
 30 pater ; Diespiter is the Djaus pita of the Vedas. An 
 unexpected light has been thrown on many an enig- 
 matical form in the Hellenic mythology by recent re- 
 
78 THE GR&CO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 searches regarding the earlier divinities of India. The 
 hoary, mysterious forms of the Erinnyes are no Hellenic 
 inventions ; they were immigrants along with the oldest 
 settlers from the East. The divine grayhound Sarama, 
 who guards for the Lord of heaven the golden herd of 5 
 stars and sunbeams, and collects for Him the nourish 
 ishing rain-clouds as the cows of heaven to the milking, 
 and who, moreover, faithfully conducts the pious dead 
 into the world of the blessed, becomes in the hands of 
 the Greeks the son of Sarama, Sarameyas, or Herme- re 
 ias ; and the enigmatical Hellenic story of the stealing 
 of the cattle of Helios, which is beyond doubt con- 
 nected with the Roman legend about Cacus, is now 
 seen to be a last echo (with the meaning no longer un- 
 derstood) of that old fanciful and significant conception 15 
 of nature. 
 
 The task, however, of determining the degree of 
 culture which the Indo-Germans had attained before 
 the separation of the stocks properly belongs to the 
 general history of the ancient world. It is, on the 20 
 other hand, the special task of Italian history to ascer- 
 tain, so far as it is possible, what was the state of the 
 Graeco- Italian nation when the Hellenes and the Ital- 
 ians parted. Nor is this a superfluous labor ; we reach 
 by means of it the stage at which Italian civilization 25 
 commenced, the starting-point of the national history. 
 
 While it is probable that the Indo-Germans led a 
 pastoral life, and were acquainted with the cereals, if 
 at all, only in their wild state, all indications point to 
 the conclusion that the Grasco-Italians were a grain- 30 
 cultivating, perhaps even a vine-cultivating, people. 
 The evidence of this is not simply the knowledge of 
 
MOMMSEtf. 
 
 79 
 
 agriculture itself common to both, for this does not, 
 upon the whole, warrant the inference of community of 
 origin in the peoples who may exhibit it. An histori- 
 cal connection between the Indo-Germanic agriculture 
 5 and that of the Chinese, Aramaean, and Egyptian 
 stocks can hardly be disputed ; and yet these stocks 
 are either alien to the Indo-Germans, or, at any rate, 
 became separated from them at a time when agriculture 
 was certainly still unknown. The truth is, that the 
 
 o more advanced races in ancient times were, as at the 
 present day, constantly exchanging the implements and 
 the plants employed in cultivation ; and when the an- 
 nals of China refer the origin of Chinese agriculture 
 to the introduction of five species of grain that took 
 
 1 5 place under a particular king in a particular year, the 
 story undoubtedly depicts correctly, at least in a gen- 
 eral way, the relations subsisting in the earliest epochs 
 of civilization. A common knowledge of agriculture, 
 like a common knowledge of the alphabet, of war char- 
 
 20 iots, of purple, and other implements and ornaments, 
 far more frequently warrants the inference of an ancient 
 intercourse between nations than of their original unity. 
 But, as regards the Greeks and Italians, whose mutual 
 relations are comparatively well known, the hypothesis 
 
 25 that agriculture, as well as writing and coinage, first 
 came to Italy by means of the Hellenes may be char- 
 acterized as wholly inadmissible. On the other hand, 
 the existence of a most intimate connection between 
 the agriculture of the one country and that of the other 
 
 30 is attested by their possessing in common all the oldest 
 expressions relating to it : ager, &yp6s ; aro aratrum, 
 dp6u Uporpov ; ligo alongside of Xax^w; hortus, 
 
80 THE GR&CO-ITALIAN' STOCJC. 
 
 hordeum, KpiOtf milium, /-teX^r; ; rapa^ 
 juaXcix??; vinum, oTvos. It is likewise attested by the 
 agreement of Greek and Italian agriculture in the form 
 of the plough, which appears in the same shape on the 
 old Attic and the old Roman monuments ; in the choice 5 
 of the most ancient kinds of grain millet, barley, 
 spelt ; in the custom of cutting the ears with the sickle, 
 and having them trodden out by cattle on the smooth- 
 beaten threshing-floor ; lastly, in the mode of preparing 
 the grain pills, 7r6Xros ; pinso, TTT/O-O-W ; mold, p!)\i) ; for 10 
 baking was of more recent origin, and on that account 
 dough or pap was always used in the Roman ritual in- 
 stead of bread. That the culture of the vine, too, in 
 Italy was anterior to the earliest Greek immigration, is 
 shown by the appellation " wine-land " (Olvurpta), which 15 
 appears to reach back to the oldest visits of Greek voy- 
 agers. It would thus appear that the transition from 
 pastoral life to agriculture, or, to speak more correctly, 
 the combination of agriculture with the earlier pastoral 
 economy, must have taken place after the Indians had 20 
 departed from the common cradle of the nations, but 
 before the Hellenes and Italians dissolved their ancient 
 communion. Moreover, at the time when agriculture 
 originated, the Hellenes and Italians appear to have 
 been united as one national whole, not merely with 25 
 each other, but with other members of the great family ; 
 at least, it is a fact, that the most important of those 
 terms of cultivation, while they are foreign to the Asi- 
 atic members of the Indo-Germanic family, are used by 
 the Romans and Greeks in common with the Celtic as 30 
 well as the Germanic, Slavonic, and Lithuanian stocks. 
 The distinction between the common inheritance of 
 
MO MM SEN. 8 1 
 
 the nations and their own subsequent acquisitions in 
 manners and in language, is still far from having been 
 wrought out in all the variety of its details and grada- 
 tions. The investigation of languages with this view 
 5 has scarcely begun, and history still in the main derives 
 its representation of primitive times, not from the rich 
 mine of language, but from what must be called, for the 
 /nost part, the rubbish-heap of tradition. For the pres- 
 ent, therefore, it must suffice to indicate the differences 
 
 10 between the culture of the Indo-Germanic family in its 
 earliest entireness, and the culture of that epoch when 
 the Graeco-Italians still lived together. The task of dis- 
 criminating the results of culture which are common to 
 the European members of this family, but foreign to its 
 
 1 5 Asiatic members, from those which the several Euro- 
 pean groups, such as the Graeco-Italian and the Ger- 
 mano-Slavonic, have wrought out for themselves, can 
 only be accomplished, if at all, after greater progress 
 has been made in philological and historical inquiries. 
 
 20 But there can be no doubt that, with the Graeco-Ital- 
 ians, as with all other nations, agriculture became, and 
 in the mind of the people remained, the germ and core 
 of their national and their private life. The house and 
 the fixed hearth, which the husbandman constructs, in- 
 
 25 stead of the light hut and shifting fireplace of the shep- 
 herd, are represented in the spiritual domain and 
 idealized in the Goddess Vesta, or 'Eo-rJa, almost the 
 only divinity not Indo-Germanic, yet from the first com- 
 mon to both nations. One of the oldest legends of the 
 
 30 Italian race ascribes to King Italus, or, as the Italians 
 must have pronounced the word, Vitalus, or Vitulus, 
 the introduction of the change from a pastoral to an 
 6 
 
82 THE GR&CO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 agricultural life, and shrewdly connects with it the 
 original Italian legislation. We have simply another 
 version of the same belief in the legend of the Samnite 
 race, which makes the ox the leader of their primitive 
 colonies, and in the oldest Latin national names which S 
 designate the people as reapers (Siculi, perhaps also 
 Sicani\ or as field-laborers (Opsci). It is one of the 
 characteristic incongruities which attach to the so-called 
 legend of the origin of Rome, that it represents a pas- 
 toral and hunting people as founding a city. Legend IG 
 and faith, laws and manners, among the Italians as 
 among the Hellenes, are throughout associated with 
 agriculture. 
 
 Cultivation of the soil cannot be conceived without 
 some measurement of it, however rude. Accordingly, 15 
 the measures of surface and the mode of setting off 
 boundaries rest, like agriculture itself, on a like basis 
 among both peoples. The Oscan and Umbrian vorsus 
 of one hundred feet square corresponds exactly with the 
 Greek plethron. The principle of marking off bound- 20 
 aries was also the same. The land-measurer adjusted 
 his position with reference to one of the cardinal 
 points, and proceeded to draw, in the first place, two 
 lines, one from north to south and another from east 
 to west, his station being at their point of intersection 25 
 (templum, renews, from rfyvw) then he drew, at certain 
 fixed distances, lines parallel to these, and by this pro- 
 cess produced a series of rectangular pieces of ground, 
 the corners of which were marked by boundary posts 
 (termini, in Sicilian inscriptions r^/xoves, usually fyoi). 30 
 This mode of defining boundaries, which is indeed also 
 Etruscan, but is hardly of Etruscan origin, we find 
 
MOMMSEN. 83 
 
 among the Romans, Umbrians, Samnites, and also in 
 very ancient records of the Tarentine Heracleots, who 
 are as little likely to have borrowed it from the Italians 
 as the Italians from the Tarentines ; it is an ancient 
 5 possession common to all. A peculiar characteristic 
 of the Romans, on the other hand, was their rigid carry- 
 ing out of the principle of the square ; even where the 
 sea or a river formed a natural boundary, they did not 
 accept it, but wound up their allocation of the land 
 
 10 with the last complete square. 
 
 It is not solely in agriculture, however, that the 
 especially close relationship of the Greeks and Italians 
 appears ; it is unmistakably manifest also in the othei 
 provinces of man's earliest activity. The Greek house, 
 
 15 as described by Homer, differs little from the model 
 which was always adhered to in Italy. The essential 
 portion, which originally formed the whole interior ac- 
 commodation of the Latin house, was the atrium that 
 is, the " blackened " chamber with the household al- 
 
 20 tar, the marriage bed, the table for meals, and the 
 hearth ; and precisely similar is the Homeric megaron, 
 with its household altar and hearth and smoke-begrimed 
 roof. We cannot say the same of shipbuilding. The 
 boat with oars was an old, common possession of the 
 
 25 Indo-Germans ; but the advance to the use of sailing 
 vessels can scarcely be considered to have taken place 
 during the Graeco-Italian period, for we find no nautical 
 terms originally common to the Greeks and Italians, 
 except such as are also general among the Indo-Ger- 
 
 30 manic family. On the other hand, the primitive Italian 
 custom of the husbandmen having common midday 
 meals, the origin of which the myth connects with the 
 
84 THE GR&CO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 introduction of agriculture, is compared by Aristotle 
 with the Cretan Syssitia ; and the ancient Romans 
 further agreed with the Cretans and Laconians in tak- 
 ing their meals not, as was afterwards the custom among 
 both peoples, in a reclining, but in a sitting posture. 5 
 The method of kindling fire by the friction of two 
 pieces of wood of different kinds is common to all peo- 
 ples ; but it is certainly no mere accident that the 
 Greeks and Italians agree in the appellations which 
 they give to the two portions of the touchwood, " the ia 
 rubber " (rptTravov, terebrd), and the " under-layer " 
 vrdpevs, foxApa, tabula, probably from tendere, r^ra/iai). In 
 like manner, the dress of the two peoples is essentially 
 identical, for the tunica quite corresponds with the 
 chiton, and the toga is nothing but a fuller himation. 15 
 Even as regards weapons of war, liable as they are to 
 frequent change, the two peoples have this much at 
 least in common, that their two principal weapons of 
 attack were the javelin and the bow a fact which is 
 clearly expressed, as far as Rome is concerned, in the 20 
 earliest names for warriors (guirites, samnites, pilumni 
 arquites), and is in keeping with the oldest mode of 
 fighting which was not properly adapted to a close 
 struggle. Thus, in the language and manners of Greeks 
 and Italians, all that relates to the material foundations 25 
 of human life may be traced back to the same primary 
 elements ; the oldest problems which the world pro- 
 poses to man had been jointly solved by the two. peo- 
 ples at a time when they still formed one nation. 
 
 It was otherwise in the spiritual domain. The great 30 
 problem of man how to live in conscious harmony 
 with himself, with his neighbor, and with the whole to 
 
MOMMSEN. 85 
 
 which he belongs admits of as many solutions as there 
 are provinces in our Father's kingdom ; and it is in 
 this, and not \n the material sphere, that individuals 
 and nations display their divergences of character. 
 5 The exciting causes which gave rise to this intrinsic 
 contrast must have been in the Graeco-Italian period as 
 yet wanting; it was not until the Hellenes and Italians 
 had separated that that deep-seated diversity of mental 
 character became manifest, the effects of which con- 
 
 10 tinue to the present day. The family and the state, 
 religion and art, received in Italy and in Greece re- 
 spectively a development so peculiar and so thoroughly 
 national, that the common basis, on which in these 
 respects also the two peoples rested, has been so over- 
 
 15 grown as to be almost concealed from our view. That 
 Hellenic character, which sacrificed the whole to its in- 
 dividual elements, the nation to the township, the town- 
 ship to the citizen ; which sought the ideal of life in 
 the beautiful and the good, and, but too often, in the 
 
 20 enjoyment of idleness; which obtained its political 
 development by intensifying the original individuality 
 of the several cantons, and at length produced the in- 
 ternal dissolution of even local authority ; which in its 
 view of religion first invested the gods with human at- 
 
 25 tributes, and then denied their existence ; which al- 
 lowed full play to the limbs in the sports of the naked 
 youth, and gave free scope to thought in all its grand- 
 eur and in all its awfulness ; and that Roman charac- 
 ter, which solemnly bound the son to reverence the 
 
 30 father, the citizen to reverence the ruler, and all to rev- 
 erence the gods ; which required nothing and honored 
 nothing but the useful act, and compelled every citizsn 
 
86 THE GR^CO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 to fill up every moment of his brief life with unceasing 
 work ; which made it a duty even in the boy modestly 
 to cover the body ; which deemed every one a bad 
 citizen who wished to be different from his fellows ; 
 which regarded the state as all in all, and a desire for 5 
 the state's extension as the only aspiration not liable to 
 censure, who can in thought trace back these sharply- 
 marked contrasts to that original unity which embraced 
 them both, prepared the way for their development, and 
 at length produced them ? It would be foolish pre- IQ 
 sumption to desire to lift this veil ; we shall only en- 
 deavor to indicate in brief outline the beginnings of 
 Italian nationality and its connections with an earlier 
 period ; to direct the guesses of the discerning reader 
 rather than to express them. 15 
 
 All that may be called the patriarchal element in the 
 state rested in Greece and Italy on the same founda- 
 tions. Under this head comes especially the moral and 
 decorous arrangement of the relations of the sexes, 
 which enjoined monogamy on the husband and visited 20 
 with heavy penalties the infidelity of the wife, and 
 which recognized the equality of woman and the sanc- 
 tity of marriage in the high position which it assigned 
 to the mother within the domestic circle. On the other 
 hand, the rigorous development of the marital and still 25 
 more of the paternal authority, regardless of the nat- 
 ural rights of persons as such, was a feature foreign to 
 the Greeks, and peculiarly Italian ; it was in Italy alone 
 that moral subjection became transformed into legal 
 slavery. In the same way, the principle of the slave's 3 
 being completely destitute of legal rights a principle 
 involved in the very nature of slavery was maintained 
 
MOMMSEN. 87 
 
 by the Romans with merciless rigor and carried out to 
 ail its consequences ; whereas among the Greeks, alle- 
 viations of its harshness were early introduced, both in 
 practice and in legislation, the marriage of slaves, for 
 5 example, being recognized as a legal relation. 
 
 On the household was based the clan that is, the 
 community of the descendants of the same progenitor ; 
 and out of the clan, among the Greeks as well as the 
 Italians, arose the state. But, while under the weaker 
 
 LO political development of Greece the clan maintained 
 itself as a corporate power, in contradistinction to that 
 of the state, far even into historic times, the state in 
 Italy made its appearance at once in complete effi- 
 ciency, inasmuch as in presence of its authority the 
 
 15 clans were neutralized, and it exhibited an association 
 not of clans, but of citizens. Conversely, again, the 
 individual attained relatively to the clan an inward in- 
 dependence and freedom of personal development far 
 earlier and more completely in Greece than in Rome 
 
 20 a fact reflected with great clearness in the Greek and 
 Roman proper names, which, originally similar, came 
 to assume very different forms. In the more ancient 
 Greek names, the name of the clan was very frequently 
 added in an adjective form to that of the individual ; 
 
 2 5 while, conversely, Roman scholars were aware that 
 their ancestors bore originally only one name, the later 
 prcenomen. But, while in Greece the adjective name of 
 the clan early disappeared, it became, among the Ital- 
 ians generally, and not merely among the Romans, the 
 
 30 principal name; and the distinctive individual name, 
 the pranomen, became subordinate. It seems as if the 
 small and ever diminishing number and the meaning- 
 
88 THE GRAECO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 less character of the Italian, and particularly of the 
 Roman, individual names, compared with the luxuriant 
 and poetical fulness of those of the Greeks, were in- 
 tended to illustrate the truth that it was characteristic 
 of the one nation to reduce all features of distinctive 5 
 personality to an uniform level, of the other freely to 
 promote their development. 
 
 The association in communities of families under 
 patriarchal chiefs, which we may conceive to have pre- 
 vailed in the Graeco-Italian period, may appear differ- ic 
 ent enough from the later forms of Italian and Hellenic 
 politics ; yet it must have already contained the germs 
 out of which the future laws of both nations were 
 moulded. The " laws of King Italus," which were still 
 applied in the time of Aristotle, may denote the insti-i5 
 tutions essentially common to both. These laws must 
 have provided .for the maintenance of peace and the 
 execution of justice within the community, for military 
 organization and martial law in reference to its external 
 relations, for its government by a patriarchial chief, for 20 
 a council of elders, for assemblies of the freemen capa- 
 ble of bearing arms, and for some sort of constitution. 
 Judicial procedure (crimen, /c/otmv), expiation (p<zna, 
 Troivri), retaliation (talio, raXdw, rX^at), are Graeco-Italian 
 ideas. The stern law of debt, by which the debtor was 25 
 directly responsible with his person for the repayment 
 of what he had received, is common to the Italians, for 
 example, with the Tarentine Heracleots. The funda- 
 mental ideas of. the Roman constitution a king, a sen- 
 ate, and an assembly entitled simply to ratify or to re- 30 
 ject the proposals which the king and senate should 
 to it are scarcely anywhere expressed so dis- 
 
MOMMSEN. 89 
 
 tinctly as in Aristotle's account of the earlier constitu- 
 tion of Crete. The germs of larger state-confederacies 
 in the political fraternizing or even amalgamation 
 of several previously independent stocks (symmachy, 
 5 synoikismos) are in like manner common to both na- 
 tions. The more stress is to be laid on this fact of the 
 common foundations of Hellenic and Italian polity, 
 that it is not found to extend to the other Indo-Ger- 
 manic stocks ; the organization of the Germanic com- 
 
 jo munities, for example, by no means starts, like that of 
 the Greeks and Romans, from an elective monarchy. 
 But how different the politics were that were con- 
 structed on this common basis in Italy and Greece, 
 and how completely the whole course of their political 
 
 15 development belongs to each as its distinctive property, 
 it will be the business of the sequel to show. 
 
 It is the same in religion. In Italy, as in Hellas, 
 there lies at the foundation of the popular faith the 
 same common treasure of symbolic and allegorical 
 
 20 views of nature : on this rests that general analogy be- 
 tween the Roman and the Greek world of Gods and of 
 spirits, which was to become of so much importance in 
 later stages of development. In many of their particu- 
 lar conceptions also, in the already mentioned forms 
 
 25 of Zeus-Diovis and Hestia-Vesta, in the idea of the holy 
 space (rfaevos templum), in many offerings and cere- 
 monies the two modes of worship do not by mere 
 accident coincide. Yet in Hellas, as in Italy, they as- 
 sumed a shape so thoroughly national and peculiar, 
 
 30 that but little of the ancient common inheritance was 
 preserved in a recognizable form, and that little was for 
 the most part misunderstood or not understood at all. 
 
90 THE GRJZCO-ITALTAN STOCK. 
 
 It could not be otherwise ; for, just as in the peoples 
 themselves the great contrasts, which during the Graeco- 
 Italian period had lain side by side undeveloped, were 
 after their division distinctly evolved, so in their religion 
 also a separation took place between the idea and the 5 
 image, which had hitherto been one whole in the soul. 
 Those old tillers of the ground, when the clouds were 
 driving along the sky, probably expressed to themselves 
 the phenomenon by saying that the hound of the gods 
 was driving together the startled cows of the herd. The ic 
 Greek forgot that the cows were really the clouds, and 
 converted the son of the hound of the gods a form 
 devised merely from the particular purposes of that con- 
 ception into the adroit messenger of the gods ready 
 for every service. When the thunder rolled among the 15 
 mountains, he saw Zeus brandishing his bolts on Olym 
 pus ; when the blue sky again smiled upon him, he 
 gazed into the bright eye of Athenaea, the daughter of 
 Zeus ; and so powerful over him was the influence of 
 the forms which he had thus created, that he soon saw 20 
 nothing in them but human beings invested and 
 illumined with the splendor of nature's power, and 
 freely formed and transformed them according to the 
 laws of beauty. It was in another fashion, but not less 
 strongly, that the deeply implanted religious feeling of 25 
 the Italian race manifested itself ; it held firmly by the 
 idea and did not suffer the form to obscure it. As the 
 Greek, when he sacrificed, raised his eyes to heaven, so 
 the Roman veiled his head ; for the prayer of the for- 
 mer was contemplation, that of the latter reflection. 30 
 Throughout the whole of nature he adored the spiritual 
 and the universal. To everything existing, to the man 
 
MOM MS EN. gi 
 
 and to the tree, to the state and to the store-room, was 
 assigned a spirit which came into being with it and per- 
 ished along with it, the counterpart of the natural phe- 
 nomenon in the spiritual domain ; to the man the male 
 5 Genius, to the woman the female Juno, to the boundary 
 Terminus, to the forest Sylvanus, to the. circling year 
 Vertumnus, and so on to every object after its kind. 
 In occupations the very steps of the process were spir- 
 itualized : thus, for example, in the prayer for the hus- 
 
 ibandman there was invoked the spirit of the fallowing, 
 of ploughing, of furrowing, sowing, covering-in, harrow- 
 ing, and so forth down to the in-bringing, up'storing, 
 and opening of the granaries. In like manner marriage, 
 birth, and every other natural event were endowed with 
 
 ^5 a sacred life. The larger the sphere embraced in the 
 abstraction, the higher rose the god and the reverence 
 paid by man. Thus Jupiter and Juno are the abstrac- 
 tions of manhood and womanhood ; Dea Dia, or Ceres, 
 the creative power ; Minerva, the power of memory ; 
 
 10 Dea Bona, or among the Samnites Dea Cupra, the good 
 deity. While to the Greek everything assumed a con- 
 crete and corporeal shape, the Roman could only make 
 use of abstract, completely transparent formulas ; and 
 while the Greek for the most part threw aside the old 
 
 <5 legendary treasures of primitive times, because they 
 embodied the idea in too transparent a form, the Roman 
 could still less retain them, because the sacred concep- 
 tions seemed to him dimmed even by the lightest veil 
 of allegory. Not a trace has been preserved among 
 
 30 the Romans even of the oldest and most generally dif- 
 fused myths, such as that current among the Indians, 
 the Greeks, and even the Semites, regarding a great 
 
92 THE GRsECO-ITALIAN STOCK'. 
 
 flood and its survivor, the common ancestor of the pres- 
 ent human race. Their gods could not marry and be- 
 get children like those of the Hellenes ; they did not 
 walk about unseen among mortals ; and they needed 
 no nectar. But that they, nevertheless, in their spir- 5 
 ituality which appears tame only to dull apprehension 
 gained a powerful hold on men's minds, a hold .more 
 powerful perhaps than the gods of Hellas created after 
 the image of man, would be attested, even if history 
 were silent on the subject, by the -Roman designation 10 
 of faith (the word and the idea alike foreign to the 
 Hellenes), Religio, that is to say, " that which binds." 
 As India and Iran developed from one and the same 
 inherited store, the former, the richly varied forms of 
 its sacred epics, the latter, the abstractions of the Zend- 15 
 Avesta; so in the Greek mythology the person is pre- 
 dominant, in the Roman the idea, in the former free- 
 dom, in the latter necessity. 
 
 Lastly, what holds good of real life is true also of its 
 counterfeit in jest and play, which everywhere, and 20 
 especially in the earliest period of full and simple ex- 
 istence, do not exclude the serious, but veil it. The 
 simplest elements of art are in Latium and Hellas quite 
 the same; the decorous armed dance, the " leap " (tru 
 umpus epia/jipos 5t-0iVa/z/3os) ; the masquerade of the " full 25 
 people " (ffdrvpoi, satura), who, enveloped in the skins of 
 sheep or goats, wound up the festival with their jokes ; 
 lastly, the pipe, which with suitable strains accompanied 
 and regulated the solemn as well as the merry dance. 
 Nowhere, perhaps, does the especially close relationship 30 
 of the Hellenes and Italians come to light so clearly as 
 here ; and yet in no other direction did the two nations 
 
MOMMSEtf. 
 
 93 
 
 manifest greater divergence as they became developed. 
 The training of youth remained in Latium strictly con- 
 fined to the narrow limits of domestic education ; in 
 Greece the yearning after a varied yet harmonious train- 
 5 ing of mind and body created the sciences of Gymnas- 
 tics and Paideia, which were cherished by the nation 
 and by individuals as their highest good. Latium in 
 the poverty of its artistic development stands almost on 
 a level with uncivilized peoples ; Hellas developed with 
 
 to incredible rapidity out of its religious conceptions the 
 myth and the worshipped idol, and out of these that 
 marvellous world of poetry and sculpture, the like of 
 which history has not again to show. In Latium no 
 other influences were powerful in public and private 
 
 15 life but prudence, riches, and strength ; it was reserved 
 for the Hellenes to feel the blissful ascendancy of 
 beauty, to minister to the fair boy-friend with an en- 
 thusiasm half sensuous, half ideal, and to reanimate 
 their lost courage with the war-songs of the divine 
 
 20 singer. 
 
 Thus the two nations in which the civilization of an- 
 tiquity culminated stand side by side, as different in 
 development as they were in origin identical. The 
 points in which the Hellenes excel the Italians are more 
 
 25 universally intelligible and reflect a more brilliant lustre ; 
 but the deep feeling in each individual that he was only 
 a part of the community, a rare devotedness and power 
 of self-sacrifice for the common weal, an earnest faith 
 in its own gods, form the rich treasure of the Italian 
 
 30 nation. Both nations received a one-sided, and there- 
 fore each a complete, development ; it is only a pitiful 
 narrow-mindedness that will object to the Athenian that 
 
94 
 
 THE GRJECO-ITALIAN STOCK. 
 
 he did not know how to mould his state like the Fabii 
 and Valerii, or to the Roman that he did not learn to 
 carve like Phidias and to write like Aristophanes. It 
 was in fact the most peculiar and the best feature in the 
 character of the Greek people, that rendered it impos- 5 
 sible for them to advance from national to political 
 unity without at the same time exchanging their polity 
 for despotism. The ideal world of beauty was all in 
 all to the Greeks, and compensated them to some 
 extent for what they wanted in reality. Whenever in 10 
 Hellas a tendency toward national union appeared, it 
 was based not on elements directly political, but on 
 games and art : the contests at Olympia, the poems of 
 Homer, the tragedies of Euripides, were the only bonds 
 that held Hellas together. Resolutely, on the other ir 
 hand, the Italian surrendered his own personal will for 
 the sake of freedom, and learned to obey his father that 
 he might know how to obey the state. Amidst this 
 subjection individual development might be marred, 
 and the germs of fairest promise in man might be 20 
 arrested in the bud ; the Italian gained in their stead 
 a feeling of fatherland and patriotism such as the Greek 
 never knew, and alone among all the civilized nations 
 of antiquity succeeded in working out national unity in 
 connection with a constitution based on self-govern- 2* 
 ment a national unity, which at last placed in his 
 hands the mastery not only over the divided Hellenic 
 stock, but over the whole known world. 
 
VI 
 
 American Xox>e of ffreefcom. 
 EDMUND BURKE, 1720-1797. 
 
 Burke's explanation of the causes of the American love of free- 
 dom was given March 22, 1775, in tne English House of Com- 
 mons, in the Speech on Conciliation with America, sometimes 
 called the Speech of the Thirteen Resolutions. There Burke 
 argued that tp do away with the discontent of the Colonies con- 
 ciliation was better than violence. One of the things which, he 
 said, made force useless was the fierce love of freedom among the 
 Americans. This temper he discussed in the following bit of 
 exposition subordinated to the general purpose of the argument. 
 The text is that of Morley's " Universal Library," London, 1886. 
 
 The selection illustrates not merely clear division of subject- 
 matter, but unusual skill in transition from part to part. 
 
 IN this character of the Americans, a love of free- 
 dom is the predominating feature which marks and 
 distinguishes the whole ; and as an ardent is always a 
 jealous affection, your colonies become suspicious, 
 
 5 restive, and untractable, whenever they see the least 
 attempt to wrest from them by force or shuffle from 
 them by chicane, what they think the only advantage 
 worth living for. This fierce spirit of liberty is stronger 
 in the English colonies probably than in any other 
 
 10 people of the earth; and this from a great variety of 
 powerful causes ; which to understand the true temper 
 
 95 
 
96 THE AMERICAN LOVE OF FREEDOM. 
 
 of their minds, and the direction which this spirit 
 takes, it will not be amiss to lay open somewhat more 
 largely. 
 
 First, the people of the colonies are descendants of 
 Englishmen. England, Sir, is a nation which still I 5 
 hope respects, and formerly adored, her freedom. The 
 colonists emigrated from you when this part of your 
 character was most predominant* and they took this 
 bias and direction the moment they parted from your 
 hands. They are therefore not only devoted to liberty, 10 
 but to liberty according to English ideas, and on Eng- 
 lish principles. Abstract liberty, like other mere ab- 
 stractions, is not to be found. Liberty inheres in some 
 sensible object ; and every nation has formed to itself 
 some favorite point, which by way of eminence be- 15 
 comes the criterion of their happiness. It happened, 
 you know, Sir, that the great contests for freedom in this 
 country were from the earliest times chiefly upon the 
 question of taxing. Most of the contests in the ancient 
 commonwealths turned primarily on the right of elec- 20 
 tion of magistrates ; or on the balance among the 
 several orders of the State. The question of money 
 was not with them so immediate. But in England it 
 was otherwise. On this point of taxes the ablest pens 
 and most eloquent tongues have been exercised ; the 25 
 greatest spirits have acted and suffered. In order to 
 give the fullest satisfaction concerning the importance 
 of this point, it was not only necessary for those who 
 in argument defended the excellence of the English 
 Constitution to insist on this privilege of granting 30 
 money as a dry point of fact, and to prove that the 
 right had been acknowledged in ancient parchments 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 97 
 
 and blind usage to reside in a certain body called a 
 House of Commons. They went much farther ; they 
 attempted to prove, and they succeeded, that in theory 
 it ought to be so, from the particular nature of a House 
 5 of Commons as an immediate representative of the 
 people, whether the old records had delivered this 
 oracle or not. They took infinite pains to inculcate, 
 as a fundamental principle, that in all monarchies the 
 people must in effect themselves, mediately or imme- 
 
 lodiately, possess the power of granting their own money, 
 or no shadow of liberty could subsist. The colonies 
 draw from you, as with their life blood, these ideas and 
 principles. Their love of liberty, as with you, fixed 
 and attached on this specific point of taxing. Liberty 
 
 1 5 might be safe, or might be endangered, in twenty 
 other particulars, without their being much pleased or 
 alarmed. Here they felt its pulse ; and as they found 
 that beat, they thought themselves sick or sound. I do 
 not say whether they were right or wrong in applying 
 
 20 your general arguments to their own case. It is not 
 easy indeed to make a monopoly of theorems and 
 corollaries. The fact is, that they did thus apply those 
 general arguments ; and your mode of governing them, 
 whether through lenity or indolence, through wisdom 
 
 25 or mistake, confirmed them in the imagination, that 
 they, as well as you, had an interest in these common 
 principles. 
 
 They were further confirmed in this pleasing error 
 by the form of their provincial legislative assemblies. 
 
 30 Their governments are popular in a high degree ; some 
 are merely popular ; in all, the popular representative 
 is the most weighty ; and this share of the people in 
 7 
 
98 THE AMERICAN LOVE OF FREEDOM. 
 
 their ordinary government never fails to inspire them 
 with lofty sentiments, and with a strong aversion from 
 whatever tends to deprive them of their chief impor- 
 tance. 
 
 If anything were wanting to this necessary operation 5 
 of the form of government, religion would have given 
 it a complete effect. Religion, always a principle of 
 energy, in this new people is no way worn out or im- 
 paired ; and their mode of professing it is also one 
 main cause of this free spirit. The people are Pro- 10 
 testants; and of that kind which is the most adverse 
 to all implicit submission of mind and opinion. This 
 is a persuasion not only favorable to liberty, but built 
 upon it. I do not think, Sir, that the reason of this 
 averseness in the dissenting churches, from all that 15 
 looks like absolute government, is so much to be sought 
 in their religious tenets as in their history. Every one 
 knows that the Roman Catholic religion is at least 
 coeval with most of the governments where it prevails ; 
 that it has generally gone hand in hand with them, and 20 
 received great favor and every kind of support from 
 authority. The Church of England too was formed 
 from her cradle under the nursing care of regular 
 government. But the dissenting interests have sprung 
 up in direct opposition to all the ordinary powers of 25 
 the world ; and could justify that opposition only on a 
 strong claim to natural liberty. Their very existence 
 depended on the powerful and unremitted assertion of 
 that claim. All Protestantism, even the most cold and 
 passive, is a sort of dissent. But the religion most 30 
 prevalent in our northern colonies is a refinement on 
 the principle of resistance ; it is the dissidence of dis- 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 
 
 99 
 
 sent, and the Protestantism of the Protestant religion. 
 This religion, under a variety of denominations agree- 
 ing in nothing but in the communion of the spirit of 
 liberty, is predominant in most of the northern pro< 
 
 5 vinces, where the Church of England, notwithstanding 
 its legal rights, is in reality no more than a sort of 
 private sect, not composing most probably the tenth of 
 the people. The colonists left England when this 
 spirit was high, and in the emigrants was the highest 
 
 roof all, and even that stream of foreigners, which has 
 been constantly flowing into these colonies, has, for 
 the greatest part, been composed of dissenters from 
 the establishments of their several countries, and have 
 brought with them a temper and character far from 
 
 15 alien to that of the people with whom they mixed. 
 
 Sir, I can perceive by their manner, that some gen- 
 tlemen object to the latitude of this description, because 
 in the southern colonies the Church of England forms 
 a large body, and has a regular establishment. It is 
 
 20 certainly true. There is, however, a circumstance at- 
 tending these colonies, which, in my opinion, fully 
 counterbalances this difference, and makes the spirit of 
 liberty still more high and haughty than in those to the 
 northward. It is, that in Virginia and the Carolinas 
 
 25 they have a vast multitude of slaves. Where this is 
 the case in any part of the world, those who are free 
 are by far the most proud and jealous of their freedom. 
 Freedom is to them not only an enjoyment, but a kind 
 of rank and privilege. Not seeing there, that freedom, 
 
 30 as in countries where it is a common blessing, and as 
 broad and general as the air, may be united with much 
 abject toil, with great misery, with all the exter'or gf 
 
100 THE AMERICAN LOVE OF FREEDOM. 
 
 servitude, liberty looks, amongst them, like something 
 that is more noble and liberal. I do not mean, Sir, to 
 commend the superior morality of this sentiment, which 
 has at least as much pride as virtue in it ; but I cannot 
 alter the nature of man. The fact is so ; and these 5 
 people of the southern colonies are much more strongly, 
 and with a higher and more stubborn spirit, attached 
 to liberty, than those to the northward. Such were all 
 the ancient commonwealths ; such were our Gothic an- 
 cestors ; such in our days were the Poles ; and such 10 
 will be all masters of slaves who are not slaves them- 
 selves. In such a people, the haughtiness of domina- 
 tion combines with the spirit of freedom, fortifies it, and 
 renders it invincible. 
 
 Permit me, Sir, to add another circumstance in our 15 
 colonies, which contributes no mean part towards the 
 growth and effect of this untractable spirit. I mean 
 their education. In no country perhaps in the world is 
 the law so general a study. The profession itself is 
 numerous and powerful ; and in most provinces it takes 20 
 the lead. The greater number of the deputies sent to 
 the Congress were lawyers. But all who read (and 
 most do read), endeavor to obtain some smattering in 
 that science. I have been told by an eminent book- 
 seller, that in no branch of his business, after tracts of 25 
 popular devotion, were so many books as those on the 
 law exported to the plantations. The colonists have 
 now fallen into the way of printing them for their own 
 use. I hear that they have sold nearly as many of 
 Blackstone's Commentaries in America as in England. 3 Q 
 General Gage marks out this disposition very particu- 
 larly in a letter on your table. He states that all th<? 
 
EDMUND BttRKE: 101 
 
 people in his Government are lawyers, or smatterers in 
 law ; and that in Boston they have been enabled, by 
 successful chicane, wholly to evade many parts of one 
 of your capital penal constitutions. The smartness of 
 5 debate will say that this knowledge ought to teach them 
 more clearly the rights of legislature, their obligations 
 to obedience, and the penalties of rebellion. All this 
 is mighty well. But my honorable and learned friend 
 on the floor, who condescends to mark what I say for 
 
 -o animadversion, will disdain that ground. He has heard, 
 as well as I, that when great honors and great emolu- 
 ments do not win over this knowledge to the service of 
 the State, it is a formidable adversary to Government. 
 If the spirit be not tamed and broken by these happy 
 
 *5 methods, it is stubborn and litigious. Abeunt studia in 
 mores. This study renders men acute, inquisitive, dex- 
 terous, prompt in attack, ready in defence, full of re- 
 sources. In other countries, the people, more simple, 
 and of a less mercurial cast, judge of an ill principle in 
 
 ao government only by an actual grievance ; here they an- 
 ticipate the evil, and judge of the pressure of the griev- 
 ance by the badness of the principle. They augur 
 misgovernment at a distance ; and snuff the approach 
 of tyranny in every tainted breeze. 
 
 25 The last cause of this disobedient spirit in the colonies 
 is hardly less powerful than the rest, as it is not merely " 
 moral, but laid deep in the natural constitution of things. 
 Three thousand miles of ocean lie between you and 
 them. No contrivance can prevent the effect of this 
 
 30 distance in weakening government. Seas roll, and 
 months pass, between the order and the execution ; and 
 the want of a speedy explanation of a single point is 
 
IG2 THE AMEKJCAN'JLOYE OF FREEDOM. 
 
 enough to defeat a whole system. You have, indeed, 
 " winged ministers of vengeance/' who carry your bolts 
 in their pounces to the remotest verge of the sea. But 
 there a power steps in, that limits the arrogance of 
 raging passions and furious elements, and says, " So far 5 
 shalt thou go, and no farther." Who are you, that you 
 should fret and rage, and bite the chains of Nature ? 
 nothing worse happens to you than does to all nations 
 who have extensive empire ; and it happens in all the 
 forms into which empire can be thrown. In large 10 
 bodies, the circulation of power must be less vigorous 
 at the extremities. Nature has said it. The Turk can- 
 not govern Egypt, and Arabia, and Kurdistan, as he 
 governs Thrace ; nor has he the same dominion in 
 Crimea and Algiers which he has at Brusa and Smyrna. 15 
 Despotism itself is obliged to truck and huckster. The 
 Sultan gets such obedience as he can. He governs 
 with a loose rein, that he may govern at all ; and the 
 whole of the force and vigor of his authority in his 
 centre is derived from a prudent relaxation in all his 20 
 borders. Spain, in her provinces, is perhaps not so 
 well obeyed as you are in yours. She complies too j 
 she submits ; she watches times. This is the immu- 
 table condition, the eternal law, of extensive and de- 
 tached empire. 2/ 
 
 Then, Sir, from these six capital sources : of descent f 
 of form of government ; of religion in the northern 
 provinces ; of manners in the southern ; of education ; 
 of the remoteness of situation from the first mover of 
 government ; from all these causes a fierce spirit of 30 
 liberty has grown up. It has grown with the growth of 
 the people in your colonies, and increased with the in- 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 103 
 
 crease of their wealth ; a spirit, that unhappily meeting 
 with an exercise of power in England, which, however 
 lawful, is not reconcilable to any ideas of liberty, much 
 less with theirs, has kindled this flame that is ready to 
 5 consume us. 
 
VII. 
 
 Ube Divtefon of Xabor. 
 ADAM SMITH, 1723-1790. 
 
 This selection is from the first chapter of the first book of 
 Adam Smith's " Wealth of Nations." The work, first published 
 in 1775-76, has since been republished many times. The text 
 here is from the Edinburgh edition of 1809, a reprint of the fourth 
 edition, the last revised by the author himself. 
 
 THE greatest improvement in the productive powers 
 of labor, and the greater skill, dexterity, and judg- 
 ment with which it is anywhere directed or applied, 
 seem to have been the effects of the division of 
 labor. 5 
 
 The effects of the division of labor, in the general 
 business of society, will be more easily understood, by 
 considering in what manner it operates in some par- 
 ticular manufactures. It is commonly supposed to be 
 carried furthest in some very trifling ones ; not perhaps ia 
 that it really is carried further in them than in others 
 of more importance : but in those trifling manufactures 
 which are destined to supply the small wants of but a 
 small number of people, the whole number of workmen 
 
 104 
 
ADAM SMITH. 1 05 
 
 must necessarily be small ; and those employed in 
 every different branch of the work can often be collected 
 into the same workshop, and placed at once under 
 the view of the spectator. In those great manufact- 
 5ures, on the contrary, which are destined to supply 
 the great wants of the great body of the people, every 
 different branch of the work employs so great a num- 
 ber of workmen, that it is impossible to collect them 
 all into the same workshop. We can seldom see 
 
 10 more, at one time, than those employed in one single 
 branch. Though, in such manufactures, the work may 
 be divided into a greater number of parts, than in 
 those of a more trifling nature, the division is not near 
 so obvious, and has accordingly been much less ob 
 
 '5 served. 
 
 To take an example, therefore, from a very trifling 
 manufacture, but one in which the division of laboi 
 has been very often taken notice of, the trade of the 
 pin-maker ; a workman not educated to this business 
 
 20 (which the division of labor has rendered a distinct 
 trade), nor acquainted with the use of the machinery 
 employed in it (to the invention of which the same 
 division of labor has probably given occasion), could 
 scarce, perhaps, with his utmost industry, make one 
 
 2 5 pin in a day, and certainly could not make twenty. 
 But in the way in which this business is now carried 
 on, not only the whole work is a peculiar trade, but it 
 is divided into a number of branches, of which the 
 greater part are likewise peculiar trades. One man 
 
 30 draws out the wire, another straightens it, a third cuts 
 it, a fourth points it, a fifth grinds it at the top for re- 
 ceiving the head : to make the head requires two or 
 
106 THE DIVISION OF LABOR. 
 
 three distinct operations ; to put it on is a peculial 
 business ; to whiten the pins is another ; it is even a 
 trade by itself to put them into the paper ; and the 
 important business of making a pin is, in this manner, 
 divided into about eighteen distinct operations, which, 5 
 in some manufactories, are all performed by distinct 
 hands, though in others the same man will sometimes 
 perform two or three of them. I have seen a small 
 manufactory of this kind where ten men only were em- 
 ployed, and where some of them consequently per- IG 
 formed two or three distinct operations. But though 
 they were very poor, and therefore but indifferently 
 accommodated with the necessary machinery, they 
 could, when they exerted themselves, make among 
 them about twelve pounds of pins in a day. There 1 5 
 are in a pound upwards of four thousand pins of a 
 middling size. Those ten persons, therefore, could 
 make among them upwards of forty-eight thousand pins 
 in a day. Each person, therefore, making a tenth-part 
 of forty-eight thousand pins, might be considered as 2 ^ 
 making four thousand eight hundred pins in a day.* 
 
 * David A. Wells in his " Recent Economic Changes," New 
 York, 1889, quotes as a comment upon this passage the following 
 extract from a report on technical education to the United States 
 State Department, by United States Consul Schoenhoff, 1888 : 
 " In pinmaking the coil of brass wire is put in its proper place, the 
 end fastened, and the almost human piece of mechanism, with its 
 iron fingers, does the rest of the work. One machine makes 180 
 pins a minute, cutting the wire flattening the heads, sharpening the 
 points, and dropping the pin in its proper place. One hundred 
 and eight thousand pins a day is the output of one machine. A 
 factory visited by me employed seventy machines. These had a 
 combined output per day of 7,500,000 pins, or three hundred pins 
 
ADAM SMITH. 
 
 107 
 
 But if they had all wrought separately and independ* 
 ently, and without any of them having been educated 
 to this peculiar business, they certainly could not each 
 of them have made twenty, perhaps not one pin in a 
 5 day ; that is, certainly, not the two hundred and fortieth, 
 perhaps not the four thousand eight hundredth part of 
 what they are at present capable of performing, in con- 
 sequence of a proper division and combination of their 
 different operations. 
 
 10 In every other art and manufacture, the effects of 
 the division of labor are similar to what they are in 
 this very trifling one ; though, in many of them, the 
 labor can neither be so much subdivided, nor reduced 
 to so great a simplicity of operation. The division of 
 
 1 5 labor, however, so far as it can be introduced, occa- 
 sions, in every art, a proportionable increase of the 
 productive powers of labor. The separation of different 
 trades and employments from one another, seems to 
 have taken place, in consequence of this advantage. 
 
 20 This separation, too, is generally carried furthest in 
 those countries which enjoy the highest degree of in- 
 dustry and improvement ; what is the work of one man 
 in a rude state of society, being generally that of several 
 in an improved one. In every improved society, the 
 
 25 farmer is generally nothing but a farmer ; the manu- 
 facturer, nothing but a manufacturer. The labor, too, 
 which is necessary to produce any one complete manu- 
 facture, is almost always divided among a great number 
 
 to a paper, 25,000 papers of pins; allowing for stoppages and 
 necessary time for repairs, say 20,000 papers. These machines 
 are tended by three men. A machinist with a boy-helper attends 
 to the repairing." 
 
io8 THE DIVISION OF LABOR. 
 
 of hands. How many different trades are employed 
 in each branch of the linen and woollen manufactures, 
 from the growers of the flax and the wool, to the 
 bleachers and smoothers of the linen, or to the dyers 
 and dressers of the cloth ! The nature of agriculture, 5 
 indeed, does not admit of so many subdivisions of 
 labor, nor of so complete a separation of one business 
 from another, as manufactures. It is impossible to 
 separate so entirely the business of the grazier from 
 that of the corn-farmer, as the trade of the carpenter 10 
 is commonly separated from that of the smith. The 
 spinner is almost always a distinct person from the 
 weaver ; but the ploughman, the harrower, the sower 
 of the seed, and the reaper of the corn, are often the 
 same. The occasions for those different sorts of labor 15 
 returning with the different seasons of the year, it is 
 impossible that one man should be constantly em- 
 ployed in any one of them. This impossibility of 
 making so complete and entire a separation of all the 
 different branches of labor employed in agriculture, is 20 
 perhaps the reason why the improvement of the pro- 
 ductive powers of. labor in this art does not always 
 keep pace with their improvement in manufactures. 
 The most opulent nations, indeed, generally excel all 
 their neighbors in agriculture as well as in manufact- 25 
 ures ; but they are commonly more distinguished by 
 their superiority in the latter than in the former. Their 
 lands are in general better cultivated, and having more 
 labor and expense bestowed on them, produce more in 
 proportion to the extent and natural fertility of the 3 
 ground. But this superiority of produce is seldom 
 much more than in proportion to the superiority of 
 
ADAM SMITH, 
 
 109 
 
 labor and expense. In agriculture, the labor of the 
 rich country is not always much more productive than 
 that of the poor ; or, at least, it is never so much more 
 productive, as it commonly is in manufactures. The 
 5 corn of the rich country, therefore, will not always, in 
 the same degree of goodness, come cheaper to market 
 than that of the poor. The corn of Poland, in the 
 same degree of goodness, is as cheap as that of France, 
 notwithstanding the superior opulence and improve- 
 
 10 ment of the latter country. The corn of France is, in 
 the corn provinces, fully as good, and in most years 
 nearly about the same price with the corn of England, 
 though, in opulence and improvement, France is per- 
 haps inferior to England. The corn-lands of England, 
 
 1 5 however, are better cultivated than those of France, 
 and the corn -lands of France are said to be much 
 better cultivated than those of Poland. But though 
 the poor country, notwithstanding the inferiority of its 
 cultivation, can, in some measure, rival the rich in 
 
 20 cheapness and goodness of its corn, it can pretend to 
 no such competition in its manufactures ; at least if 
 those manufactures suit the soil, climate, and situation 
 of the rich country. The silks of France are better 
 and cheaper than those of England, because the silk 
 
 25 manufacture, at least under the present high duties 
 upon the importation of raw silk, does not so well suit 
 the climate of England, as that of France. But the 
 hardware and the coarse woollens of England are be- 
 yond all comparison superior to those of France, and 
 
 30 much cheaper, too, in the same degree of goodness. 
 In Poland there are said to be scarce any manufactures 
 of any kind, a few of those coarser household manu- 
 
1 1 o THE DIVISION OF LABOR. 
 
 factures excepted, without which no country can well 
 subsist. 
 
 This great increase of the quantity of work, which, 
 in consequence of the division of labor, the same 
 number of people are capable of performing, is owing 5 
 to three different circumstances : first, to the increase 
 of dexterity in every particular workman ; secondly, to 
 the saving of the time which is commonly lost in pass- 
 ing from one species of work to another ; lastly, to the 
 invention of a great number of machines which facili- 10 
 tate and abridge labor, and enable one man to do the 
 work of many. 
 
 First, the improvement of the dexterity of the work- 
 man necessarily increases the quantity of the work he 
 can perform ; and the division of labor, by reducing 15 
 every man's business to some one simple operation, 
 and by making this operation the sole employment of 
 his life, necessarily increases very much the dexterity 
 of the workman. A common smith, who, though ac- 
 customed to handle the hammer, has never been used 20 
 to make nails, if upon some particular occasion he is 
 obliged to attempt it, will scarce, I am assured, be able 
 to make above two or three hundred in a day, and 
 those, too, very bad ones. A smith who has been ac- 
 customed to make nails, but whose sole or principal 25 
 business has not been that of a nailer, can seldom with 
 his utmost diligence make more than eight hundred or 
 a thousand nails in a day. I have seen several boys 
 under twenty years of age who had never exercised 
 any other trade but that of making nails, and who, 3 
 when they exerted themselves, could make, each of 
 them, upwards of two thousand three hundred nails in 
 
ADAM SMITH. I x i 
 
 a day. The making of a nail, however, is by no means 
 one of the simplest operations. The same person 
 blows the bellows, stirs or mends the fire as there is 
 occasion, heats the iron, and forges every part of the 
 5 nail. In forging the head too he is obliged to change 
 his tools. The different operations into which the 
 making of a pin, or of a metal button, is subdivided, 
 are all of them much more simple, and the dexterity of 
 the person, of whose life it has been the sole business 
 
 10 to perform them, is usually much greater. The rapidity 
 with which some of the operations of those manufact- 
 ures are performed, exceeds what the human hand 
 could, by those who had never seen them, be supposed 
 capable of acquiring. 
 
 15 Secondly, the advantage which is gained by saving 
 the time commonly lost in passing from one sort of work 
 to another, is much greater than we should at first view 
 be apt to imagine it. It is impossible to pass very 
 quickly from one kind of work to another, that is carried 
 
 20 on in a different place, and with quite different tools. 
 A country weaver, who cultivates a small farm, must 
 lose a good deal of time in passing from his loom to the 
 field, and from the field to his loom. When the two 
 trades can be carried on in the same workhouse, the 
 
 25 loss of time is no doubt much less. It is even in this 
 case, however, very considerable. A man commonly 
 saunters a little in turning his hand from one sort of 
 employment to another. When he first begins the new 
 work he is seldom very keen and hearty ; his mind, as 
 
 30 they say, does not go it, and for some time he rather 
 trifles than applies to good purpose. The habit of 
 sauntering and of indolent careless application, which 
 
112 THE DIVISION OF LABOR. 
 
 is naturally, or rather necessarily, acquired by every 
 country workman who is obliged to change his work 
 and his tools every half-hour, and to apply his hand in 
 twenty different ways almost every day of his life, ren- 
 ders him almost always slothful and lazy, and incapable 5 
 of any vigorous application even on the most pressing 
 occasions. Independent, therefore, of his deficiency 
 in point of dexterity, this cause alone must always 
 reduce considerably the quantity of work which he is 
 capable of performing. ia 
 
 Thirdly and lastly, everybody must be sensible how 
 much labor is facilitated and abridged by the applica- 
 tion of proper machinery. It is unnecessary to give any 
 example. I shall only observe, therefore, that the in- 
 vention of all those machines by which labor is so much 15 
 facilitated and abridged, seems to have been originally 
 owing to the division of labor. Men are much more 
 likely to discover easier and readier methods of attain- 
 ing any object, when the whole attention of their minds 
 is directed towards that single object, than when it is 20 
 dissipated among a great variety of things. But in con- 
 sequence of the division of labor, the whole of every 
 man's attention comes naturally to be directed towards 
 some one very simple object. It is naturally to be ex- 
 pected, therefore, that some one or other of those who 25 
 are employed in each particular branch of labor should 
 soon find out easier and readier methods of performing 
 their own particular work, wherever the nature of it ad- 
 mits of such improvement. A great part of the machines 
 made use of in those manufactures in which labor is 30 
 most subdivided, were originally the inventions of com- 
 mon workmen, who being each of them employed in 
 
ADAM SMIT&. 113 
 
 some very simple operation, naturally turned their 
 thoughts towards finding out easier and readier methods 
 of performing it. Whoever has been much accustomed 
 to visit such manufactures, must frequently have been 
 5 shown very pretty machines, which were the inventions 
 of such workmen, in order to facilitate and quicken 
 their own particular part of the work. In the first steam- 
 engines, a boy was constantly employed to open and 
 ^hut alternately the communication between the boiler 
 
 10 and the cylinder, according as the piston either ascended 
 or descended. One of those boys, who loved to play 
 with his companions, observed that, by tying a string 
 from the handle of the valve which opened this com- 
 munication, to another part of the machine, the valve 
 
 15 would open and shut without his assistance, and leave 
 him at liberty to divert himself with his playfellows. 
 One of the greatest improvements that has been made 
 upon this machine, since it was first invented, was in 
 this manner the discovery of a boy who wanted to save 
 
 20 his own labor. 
 
 All the improvements in machinery, however, have 
 by no means been the inventions of those who had occa- 
 sion to use the machines. Many improvements have 
 been made by the ingenuity of the makers of the ma- 
 
 ^5 chines, when to make them became the business of a 
 peculiar trade ; and some by that of those who are called 
 philosophers or men of speculation, whose trade it is 
 not to do anything, but to observe everything ; and who, 
 upon that account, are often capable of combining 
 
 30 together the powers of the most distant and dissimilar 
 objects. In the progress of society, philosophy or spec- 
 ulation becomes, like every other employment, theprin- 
 8 
 
1 14 THE DIVISION- OF LABOR. 
 
 cipal or sole trade and occupation of a particular class 
 of citizens. Like every other employment too, it is sub- 
 divided into a great number of different branches, each 
 of which affords occupation to a peculiar tribe or class 
 of philosophers ; and this subdivision of employment c 
 in philosophy, as well as in every other business, im- 
 proves dexterity and saves time. Each individual be- 
 comes more expert in his own peculiar branch, more 
 work is done upon the whole, and the quantity of science 
 is considerably increased by it. 10 
 
 It is the great multiplication of the productions of all 
 the different arts, in consequence of the division of 
 labor, which occasions, in a well-governed society, that 
 universal opulence which extends itself to the lowest 
 ranks of the people. Every workman has a great quan- 15 
 tity of his own work to dispose of beyond what he him- 
 self has occasion for ; and every other workman being 
 exactly in the same situation, he is enabled to exchange 
 a great quantity of his own goods for a great quantity. 
 or, what comes to the same thing, for the price of a 20 
 great quantity of theirs. He supplies them abundantly 
 with what they have occasion for, and they accommodate 
 him as amply with what he has occasion for, and a 
 general plenty diffuses itself through all the different 
 ranks of the society. 25 
 
 Observe the accommodation of the most common ar- 
 tificer or day-laborer in a civilized and thriving country, 
 and you will perceive that a number of people of whose 
 industry a part, though but a small part, has been em- 
 ployed in procuring him this accommodation, exceeds 3 
 all computation. The woollen coat, for example, which 
 covers the day-laborer, as coarse and rough as it may 
 
ADAM SMITH. 1 1 5 
 
 appear, is the produce of the joint-labor of a great mul- 
 titude of workmen. The shepherd, the sorter of the 
 wool, the wool-comber or carder, the dyer, the scribbler, 
 the spinner, the weaver, the fuller, the dresser, with 
 5 many others, must all join their different arts in order 
 to complete even this homely production. How many 
 merchants and carriers, besides, must have been em- 
 ployed in transporting the materials from some of those 
 workmen to others who often live in a very distant part 
 
 10 of the country ! how much commerce and navigation in 
 particular, how many ship-builders, sailors, sail-makers, 
 rope-makers, must have been employed in order to bring 
 together the different drugs made use of by the dyer, 
 which often come from the remotest corners of the 
 
 15 world ! What a variety of labor too is necessary in 
 order to produce the tools of the meanest of those work- 
 men. To say nothing of such complicated machines as 
 the ship of the sailor, the mill of the fuller, or even the 
 loom of the weaver, let us consider only what a variety 
 
 20 of labor is requisite in order to form that very simple 
 machine, the shears with which the shepherd clips the 
 wool. The miner, the builder of the furnace for smelt- 
 ing the ore, the feller of the timber, the burner of the 
 charcoal to be made use of in the smelting-house, the 
 
 25 brick-maker, the bricklayer, the workmen who attend 
 the furnace, the mill-wright, the forger, the smith, must 
 all of them join their different arts in order to produce 
 them. Were we to examine, in the same manner, all the 
 different parts of his dress and household furniture, the 
 
 30 coarse linen shirt which he wears next his skin, the 
 shoes which cover his feet, the bed which he lies on, 
 and all the different parts which compose it, the kitchen 
 
1 16 THE DIVISION OF LABOR. 
 
 grate at which he prepares his victuals, the coals which 
 he makes use of for that purpose, dug from the bowels 
 of the earth, and brought to him perhaps by a long sea 
 and a long land carriage, all the other utensils of his 
 kitchen, all the furniture of his table, the knives and 5 
 forks, the earthen or pewter plates upon which he serves 
 up and divides his victuals, the different hands employed 
 in preparing his bread and his beer, the glass window 
 which lets in the heat and the light, and keeps out the 
 wind and the rain, with all the knowledge and art ic 
 requisite for preparing that beautiful and happy inven- 
 tion, without which these northern parts of the world 
 could scarce have afforded a very comfortable habita- 
 tion, together with the tools of all the different work- 
 men employed in producing those different conveni-i5 
 ences ; if we examine, I sav, all these things, and 
 
 ^7 O ' 
 
 consider what a variety of labor is employed about each 
 of them, we shall be sensible that without th2 assistance 
 and co-operation of many thousands, the very meanest 
 person in a civilized country could not be provided, 20 
 even according to, what we very falsely imagine, the 
 easy and simple manner in which he is commonly ac- 
 commodated. Compared, indeed, with the more ex- 
 travagant luxury of the great, his accommodation must 
 no doubt appear extremely simple and easy ; and yet 25 
 it may be true, perhaps, that the accommodation of an 
 European Prince does not always so much exceed that 
 of an industrious and frugal peasant, as the accommo- 
 dation of the latter exceeds that of many an African 
 King, the absolute master of the lives and liberties of 3 
 ten thousand naked savages. 
 
VIII. 
 
 2>octrfnes of 
 JOSIAH ROYCE, 1855. 
 
 The following exposition of the doctrines of Spinoza, from the 
 end of the second lecture of Professor Josiah Royce's " The 
 Spirit of Modern Philosophy," Boston, 1893, * s reprinted by the 
 kind permission of the publishers, Houghton, Mifflin, and Com- 
 pany. The beginning is abrupt, and in fact the whole extract 
 loses somewhat, because it is wrenched from the context. Just 
 before this the lecturer has been speaking of Spinoza's attitude 
 toward God as one of "mystic adoration." 
 
 The piece is not of a kind from which the meaning can be 
 hastily skimmed, for the subject-matter is abstract, metaphysical, 
 and accordingly hard to express. This difficulty, however, Pro- 
 fessor Royce has largely overcome by the use of such concrete 
 images as that of the circle and its diameters. The selection is 
 interesting also as a summary of parts of Spinoza's writing. In 
 this summary two methods, each valuable in its way, are em- 
 ployed : that of restating the original in new words and with new 
 illustrations ; and that of giving something of what may be 
 called the color and effect of the original by the use of bits of 
 quotation. 
 
 V. 
 
 Spinoza is n't a man of action ; his heroism, such as 
 it is, is the heroism of contemplation. He is not always, 
 let me tell you, in his religious mood ; and when he is 
 not, he appears as a cynical observer of the vanity of 
 
 117 
 
1 18 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 mortal passions. But as religious thinker, he is no 
 cynic. Unswervingly he turns from the world of finite 
 ' hopes and joys ; patiently he renounces every sort of 
 worldly comfort ; even the virtue that he seeks is not 
 the virtue of the active man. There is one good thing, 5 
 and that is the Infinite ; there is one wisdom, and that 
 is to know God ; there is one sort of true love, and that 
 is the submissive love of the saintly onlooker, who in 
 the solitude of reflection sees everywhere an all-pervad- 
 ing law, an all-conquering truth, a supreme and irre- 10 
 sistible perfection. Sin is merely foolishness ; insight 
 is the only virtue ; evil is nothing positive, but merely 
 the deprivation of good ; there is nothing to lament in 
 human affairs, except the foolishness itself of every 
 lamentation. The wise man transcends lamentation, 15 
 ceases to love finite things, ceases therefore to long and 
 to be weary, ceases to strive and to grow faint, offers 
 no foolish service to God as a gift of his own, but pos- 
 sesses his own soul in knowing God, and therefore 
 enters into the divine freedom, by reason of a clear 20 
 vision of the supreme and necessary laws of the eternal 
 world. 
 
 This, then, is the essence of Spinoza's religion. He 
 begins his essay on the " Improvement of the Under- 
 standing " with words that we now are prepared to com- 25 
 prehend. This essay and the fifth part of the ethics 
 show us Spinoza's religious attitude and experience, 
 elsewhere much veiled in his works. " After experi- 
 ence had taught me," says the essay, " that all the usual 
 surroundings of social life are vain and futile, seeing 30 
 that none of the objects of my fears contained in them- 
 selves anything either good or bad, except in so far as 
 
JOSIAH RO YCE. 1 1^ 
 
 the mind is affected by them, I finally resolved to in- 
 quire whether there might be some real good which 
 would affect the mind singly, to the exclusion of all else, 
 whether there might be anything of which the discovery 
 3 and attainment would enable me to enjoy continuous, 
 supreme, and unending happiness." Here is the start- 
 ing-point. Life for Spinoza is in the ordinary world a 
 vain life, because, for the first, it is our thinking that 
 makes the things about us good or bad to us, and not 
 
 10 any real value of the things themselves, whilst the 
 transiency, the uncertainty of these finite things brings 
 it about that, if we put our trust in them, they will ere- 
 long disappoint us. Rapidly, from this beginning, 
 Spinoza rehearses the familiar tale of the emptiness of 
 
 1 5 the life of sense and worldliness, the same tale that all 
 the mystics repeat. The reader, who has never felt this 
 experience of Spinoza and of the other mystics, always 
 feels indeed as if such seeming pessimism must be 
 largely mere sour-heartedness, or else as if the expres- 
 
 20 sion of it must be pure cant. But after all, in the world 
 of spiritual experiences, this, too, is a valuable one to 
 pass through and to record. Whoever has not sometime 
 fully felt what it is to have his whole world of finite am- 
 bitions and affections through and through poisoned, 
 
 25 will indeed not easily comprehend the gentle disdain 
 with which Spinoza, in this essay, lightly brushes aside 
 pleasure, wealth, fame, as equally and utterly worthless. 
 We know, indeed^ little of Spinoza's private life, but if 
 we should judge from his words we should say that as 
 
 30 exile he has felt just this bitterness, and has conquered 
 it, so that when he talks of vanity he knows whereof he 
 speaks. People who have never walked in the gloomy 
 
120 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 outlying wastes of spiritual darkness have never had 
 the chance to find just the sort of divine light which he 
 finally discovered there. These mystics, too, have 
 their wealth of experience ; don't doubt their sincerity 
 because they tell a strange tale. Don't doubt it even 5 
 if, like Spinoza, they join with their mysticism other 
 traits of the wonderful Jewish character, shrewd cyni- 
 cism, for instance. When they call pleasure and wealth 
 and fame all dust and ashes, they possibly know whereof 
 they speak, at least, as far as concerns themselves alone. 10 
 Spinoza, at any rate, twice in his life, refused, if his 
 biographers are right, the offered chance to attain a 
 competency. He declined these chances because, once 
 for all, worldly means would prove an entanglement to 
 him. He preferred his handicraft, and earned his liv- 15 
 ing by polishing lenses. Steadfastly, moreover, as we 
 know, he refused opportunities to get a popular fame, 
 and even to make a worthily great name. The chief 
 instance is his refusal of the professorship which the 
 Elector Palatine offered him in 1673 at Heidelberg, 20 
 under promise of complete freedom of teaching, and 
 with the obvious chance of an European reputation. 
 So Spinoza did not merely call the finite world names, 
 as many do ; he meant his word, and he kept it. He 
 was no sentimentalist, no emotional mystic. He was 25 
 cool-headed, a lover of formulas and of mathematics ; 
 but still he was none the less a true mystic. 
 
 Well, he finds the finite vain, because you have to 
 pursue it, and then it deceives you, corrupts you, de- 
 grades you, and in the end fails you, being but a fleet- 30 
 ing shadow after all. "I thus perceived," he says, 
 " that I was in a state of great peril, and I compelled 
 
JOSIAH RO yCE. ! 2 1 
 
 myself to seek with all my strength for a remedy, how- 
 ever uncertain it might be, as a sick man struggling 
 with a deadly disease, when he sees that death will surely 
 be upon him unless a remedy be found, is compelled to 
 5 seek such a remedy with all his strength, inasmuch as 
 his whole hope lies therein. All the objects pursued 
 by the multitude not only bring no remedy that tends 
 to preserve our being, but even act as hindrances, caus- 
 ing the death not seldom of those who possess them, 
 
 10 and always of those who are possessed by them." 
 " All these evils," he continues, " seem to have arisen 
 from the fact that our happiness or unhappiness has 
 
 . been made the mere creature of the thing that we hap- 
 pen to be loving. When a thing is not loved, no strife 
 
 15 arises about it ; there is no pang if it perishes, no envy 
 if another bears it away, no fear, no hate ; yes, in a 
 word, no tumult of soul. These things all come from 
 loving that which perishes, such as the objects of which 
 I have spoken. But love towards a thing eternal feasts 
 
 20 the mind with joy alone, nor hath sadness any part 
 therein. Hence this is to be prized above all, and to 
 be sought for with all our might. I have used the words 
 not at random, ' If only I could be thorough in my 
 seeking ; ' for I found that though I already saw all 
 
 25 this in mind, I could not yet lay aside avarice and 
 pleasure and ambition. Yet one thing I found, that as 
 long as I was revolving these thoughts, so long those 
 desires were always behind my back, whilst I strenu- 
 ously sought the new light ; and herein I found great 
 
 30 comfort, for I saw that my disease was not beyond hope 
 of physic. And although at first such times were rare, 
 and endured but for a little space, yet as more and more 
 
122 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 the true good lighted up my mind, such times came 
 quicker and endured longer." 
 
 vr. 
 
 This, then, the beginning of Spinoza's Pilgrim's Pio- 
 gress. But now for what distinguishes him from other 
 mystics, and makes him a philosopher, not a mere ex- ^ 
 horter. He has his religious passion, he must reflect 
 upon it. The passion any one might have who had 
 passed through the dark experience of which we spoke 
 a moment since. The philosopher must justify his faith. 
 And how hard to justify such a faith it would seem in IQ 
 this cold and severe seventeenth century. It was an 
 age, you remember, when everything held to be at all 
 occult was banished from the thoughts of the wise, and 
 when clear thinking alone was believed in, when man, 
 too, was held to be a mechanism, a curiously compli- 15 
 cated natural machine, when Hobbes, greatest amongst 
 the English speculative thinkers of the age a writer 
 much read by Spinoza could declare that the word 
 " spirit " was a meaningless sound, and that nothing 
 exists but bodies and movements. How defend a mys- 20 
 tical religious faith at such a moment ? Spinoza's de- 
 fense is so ingenious, so profound, so simple, as to give 
 us one of the most noteworthy and dramatic systems 
 ever constructed. Once more I assure you that I here 
 expound only one aspect of his thought. I ignore his 25 
 peculiar methods ; I ignore his technicalities ; I give 
 you but the kernel of his doctrine concerning religious 
 truth. 
 
 Technicalities aside, this doctrine is essentially 
 
JOSIAH RO YCE. 1 2 3 
 
 founded upon what Spinoza regards as the axiom that 
 everything in the world must be either explained by its 
 own nature, or by some higher nature.* You explain 
 a thing when you comprehend why it must be what it is. 
 5 Thus, for instance, in geometry you know that all the 
 diameters of any one circle must be precisely equal, 
 and you know that this is so, because you see why it 
 must be so.f The diameters are all drawn in the circle 
 and through the centre of it, and the circle has a certain 
 
 10 nature, a structure, a make, a build, whereby, for in- 
 stance, you distinguish it from an oval or a square. 
 This build, this make of the circle, it is that forces the 
 diameters to be equal. They can't help being equal, 
 being drawn through the centre of a. curve which has 
 
 1 5 no elongation, no bulge outwards in one direction more 
 than another, but which is evenly curved all around. 
 The nature of the circle, then, at once forces the diam- 
 eters to be equal, pins them down to equality, hems 
 in any rebellious diameter that should try to stretch out 
 
 20 farther than the others, and also explains to the reason 
 of a geometer just why this result follows. My example 
 is extremely dry and simple, but it will serve to show 
 what Spinoza is thinking of. He says now, as some- 
 thing self-evident, that anything in the world which 
 
 25 does n't directly contain its own explanation must be a 
 part of some larger nature of things which does explain 
 it, and which, accordingly, forces it to be just what it is. 
 For instance, to use my own illustration, if two mount- 
 ains had precisely the same height, as the diameters 
 
 * See Eth. I. Axioms i. and ii. Royce. 
 
 t See examples in the Tractat. de Emendat. Int. under the head 
 of rules for definition. Rovce. 
 
124 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 of a circle have precisely the same length, we should 
 surely have to suppose something in the nature of the 
 physical universe which forced just these two mountains 
 to have the same height. But, even so, as things actu- 
 ally are, we must suppose that whatever is or happens, 5 
 in case it is not a self-evident and necessary thing, must 
 have its explanation in some higher and larger nature 
 of things. Thus, once more, you yourself are either 
 what you are by virtue of your own self-evident and self- 
 made nature, or else, as is the view of Spinoza, you are 10 
 forced to be what you are by the causes that have pro- 
 duced you, and that have brought you here. Cause and 
 explanation mean for Spinoza, the same thing. He 
 knows only rigidly mathematical necessity. Yet more, 
 not only you, but every act, every thought of yours, each 15 
 quiver of your eyelashes, each least shadow of feeling 
 in your mind, must be just as much a result of the nat- 
 ure of things as your existence itself. Nothing comes 
 by chance ; everything must be what it is. Could you 
 see the world at one glance, " under the form of eter- 20 
 nity," you would see everything as a necessary result of 
 the whole nature of things. It would be as plain to you 
 that you must now have this quiver of eyelash or this 
 shade of feeling ; it would be also as plain to you why 
 you must have these seemingly accidental experiences, 25 
 as it is plain to the geometer why the evenly curved 
 circle must forbid its diameters to be unequal. It is of 
 the nature of reason to view things as necessary, as ex- 
 plicable, as results either of their own nature, or, if this 
 is n't the case, then of the higher nature of things 30 
 whereof they form a part. 
 
 From this axiom, Spinoza proceeds, by a very short 
 
JOSIAH RO YCE. 125 
 
 but thorny road, to the thought that, if this is so, there 
 must be some one highest nature of things, which ex- 
 plains all reality. That such highest nature exists, he 
 regards as self-evident. The self-explaining must, of 
 5 course, explain, and so make sure, its own existence. 
 Spinoza shows by devices which I cannot here follow 
 that there could n't be numerous self-explained and 
 separate natures of things.* The world is one, and so 
 all the things in it must be parts of one self-evident, 
 
 10 self-producing order, one nature. Spinoza conceives 
 this order, describes its self-explaining and all-produc- 
 ing character, as well as he can, and then gives it a name 
 elsewhere well known to philosophers, but used by him 
 in his own sense. He calls the supreme nature of things 
 
 15 the universal " Substance " of all the world. In it are 
 we all ; it makes us what we are ; it does what its own 
 nature determines ; it explains itself and all of us ; it 
 is n't produced, it produces ; it is uncreate, supreme 
 overruling, omnipresent, absolute, rational, irreversible, 
 
 20 unchangeable, the law of laws, the nature of natures; 
 and we we, with all our acts, thoughts, feelings, life, 
 relations, experiences are just the result of it, the con- 
 sequences of it, as the diameters are results of the 
 nature of a circle. Feel, hope, desire, choose, strive, 
 
 25 as you will, all is in you because this universal " sub- 
 stance " makes you what you are, forces you into this 
 place in the nature of things, rules you as the higher 
 truth rules the lower, as the wheel rules the spoke, as 
 the storm rules the raindrop, as the tide rules the wave- 
 
 30 let, as autumn rules the dead leaves, as the snowdrift 
 
 * Eth. I, prop. v. ; prop. viii. schol. ii. ; props, xi. and xiv. 
 Epist. xxxiv. (Hague edition). Royce. 
 
26 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 rules the fallen snowflake ; and this substance is what 
 Spinoza calls God. 
 
 If you ask what sort of thing this substance is, the 
 first answer is, it is something eternal ; and that means, 
 not that it lasts a good while, but that no possible tern- 5 
 poral view of it could exhaust its nature.* All things 
 that happen result from the one substance. This surely 
 means that what happens now and what happened mill- 
 ions of years ago are, for the substance, equally present 
 and necessary results. To illustrate once more in my ia 
 own way : A spider creeping back and forth across a 
 circle could, if she were geometrically disposed, measure 
 out in temporal succession first this diameter and then 
 that. Crawling first over one diameter, she would say, 
 "I now find this so long." Afterwards examining 15 
 another diameter, she would say, " It has now happened 
 that what I have just measured proves to be precisely 
 as long as what I measured some time since, and no 
 longer." The toil of such a spider might last many 
 hours, and be full of such successive measurements, 20 
 each marked by a spun thread of web. But the true 
 circle itself within which the web was spun, the circle 
 in actual space as the geometer knows it, would its 
 nature be thus a mere series of events, a mere succes- 
 sion of spun threads ? f No, the true circle would be 21 
 timeless, a truth founded in the nature of space, out- 
 
 * Eth. I. def. viii. and Explicatio. Royce. 
 
 t This illustration will easily be recognized as an effort at a 
 paraphrase of Eth. II. prop. viii. corroll. and schol., a passage 
 where, as in the illustration above used, one finds presented, but 
 not solved, the whole problem of the true relation of finite and in- 
 finite, temporal and eternal. Royce. 
 
JOS I AH RO YCE. 1 2 7 
 
 lasting, preceding, determining all the weary web-spin 
 ning of this time-worn spider. Even so we, spinning 
 our web of experience in all its dreary complications in 
 the midst of the eternal nature of the world-embracing 
 5 substance, imagine that our lives somehow contain true 
 novelty, discover for the substance what it never knew 
 before, invent new forms of being. We fancy our past 
 wholly past, and our future wholly unmade. We think 
 that where we have as yet spun no web there is noth- 
 
 10 ing, and that what we long ago spun has vanished, 
 broken by the winds of time, into nothingness. It is 
 not so. For the eternal substance there is no before 
 and after ; all truth is truth. " Far and forgot to me is 
 near," it says. In the unvarying precision of its math- 
 
 isematical universe, all is eternally written. 
 
 " Not all your piety nor wit 
 Can lure it back to cancel half a line, 
 Nor all your tears wash out one word of it.'* 
 
 What will be for endless ages, what has been since 
 time began, is in the one substance completely present, 
 as in one scroll may be written the joys and sorrows of 
 many lives, as one earth contains the dead of countless 
 
 20 generations, as one space enfolds all the limitless wealth 
 of figured curves and of bodily forms. 
 
 This substance, then, this eternal, is Spinoza's God. 
 In describing it I have used terms, comparisons, and 
 illustrations largely my own. I hope that I have been 
 
 25 true to the spirit of Spinoza's thought. Remember, 
 then, of the substance that it is absolutely infinite and 
 self-determined ; that it exists completely and once for 
 all ; that all the events of the world follow from it as 
 
128 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 the nature of the diameter follows from the nature of 
 the circle, and that as for yourself, it enfolds, over- 
 powers, determines, produces both you and your destiny, 
 as the storm embraces the raindrop, and as the nature 
 of a number determines the value of its factors. Yet .S 
 now you will ask one question more. This substance, 
 so awful in its fatal perfection, is it, you will say, some- 
 thing living and intelligent that I can revere, or is it 
 something dead, a mere blind force ? Spinoza answers 
 this question in a very original way. The substance, ic 
 he says, must have infinitely numerous ways of express- 
 ing itself, each complete, rounded, self-determined. It 
 is like an infinite sacred scripture, translated into end- 
 lessly numerous tongues, but complete in each tongue. 
 Of these self-expressions of the substance, we mortals 15 
 know only two. One is the material world, Spinoza 
 calls it body or bodily substance. The other is the 
 inner world of thought, Spinoza calls it thinking sub- 
 stance, or mind. These two worlds, Spinoza holds, are 
 equally real, equally revelations of the one absolute 20 
 truth, equally divine, equally full of God, equally ex- 
 pressions of the supreme order. But, for the rest, they 
 are, as they exist here about us, mutually independent. 
 The substance expresses itself in matter ; very well, 
 then, all material nature is full of rigid and mathemati- 25 
 cal law : body moves body ; line determines line in 
 space ; everything, including this bodily frame of ours, 
 is an expression of the extended or corporeal aspect or 
 attribute of the substance. In stars and in clouds, in 
 dust and in animals, in figures and in their geometrical 30 
 properties, the eternal writes its nature, as in a vast 
 hieroglyphic. Equally, however, the substance writes 
 
JOSIAH ROYCE. 129 
 
 itself in the events and the laws of mental life. And 
 that it does so, the very existence of our own minds 
 proves. Thought produces thought, just as body moves 
 body, while on the other hand it is inconceivable that 
 5 mind should act on body, or body explain mind. And 
 so these two orders, mental and corporeal, are precisely 
 parallel. For neither belongs to, or is part of, or is 
 explained by, the other. Both, then, must be equally 
 and independently expressions of God the substance. 
 
 10 Hence, as each of the two orders expresses God's 
 nature, each must be as omnipresent as the other. 
 Wherever there is a body, God, says Spinoza, has a 
 thought corresponding to that body. All nature is full 
 of thought. Nothing exists but has its own mind, just 
 
 15 as you have your mind. The more perfect body has, 
 indeed, the more perfect mind ; a crowbar is n't as 
 thoughtful as a man, because in the simplicity of its 
 metallic hardness it finds less food for thought.* But, 
 all the same, the meanest of God's creatures has some 
 
 20 sort of thought attached to it, not indeed produced or 
 affected in anywise by the corporeal nature of this thing, 
 but simply parallel thereto ; an expression, in cogitative 
 or sentient terms, of the nature of the facts here present. 
 Well, this thought is just as real an expression of the 
 
 25 divine nature as is matter. There is just as much ne- 
 cessity, connection, completeness, mutual interdepend- 
 ence, rationality, eternity, in mind as in body. Of 
 God's thought your thought is a part, just as your body 
 is a part of the embodied substance. His thinking 
 
 30 nature produces your ideas, as his corporeal nature pro- 
 
 * The illustration is my own. The thought is that of Eth. II 
 prop. xiii. and the scholium thereto, Royce. 
 
130 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 duces your nerves. There is, however, no real influence 
 of body ove-r mind, or the reverse. The two are just 
 parallel. The order and connection of ideas is the same 
 as the order and connection of things. Just so far as 
 your bodily life extends, so far and no further, in the <r 
 mental world, extends your thought. You make noth- 
 ing by your thinking but your own thoughts ; but as 
 your body is a part of nature, so also is your mind a 
 part of the infinite mind. " I declare," says Spinoza, 
 in a letter to a friend, " I declare the human mind to ic 
 be a part of nature, namely, because I hold that in 
 nature there exists an infinite power of thinking, which 
 power, so far as it is infinite, contains ideally the whole 
 of nature, in such wise that its thoughts proceed in the 
 same fashion as nature herself, being, in fact, the ideal 15 
 mirror thereof.* Hence follows that I hold the human 
 mind to be simply this same power (of divine thought), 
 not so far as it is infinite and perceives the whole of 
 nature, but as far as it perceives alone the human body ; 
 and thus I hold our human mind to be part of this in- 20 
 finite intellect." 
 
 VII. 
 
 I have thus led you a tedious way through this thorny 
 path of Spinoza's thought. I have had no hope to make 
 their connections all clear ; I shall be content if you 
 bear in mind this as the outcome : our reason perceives 
 the world to be one being, whose law is everywhere and 25 
 eternally expressed. Only this eternal point of view 
 
 *Nimirum ejus ideatum, the corrected reading of the Hague 
 edition of Van Vloten and Land. See Epist. xxxii. p. 130. 
 Koyce. 
 
JOS I AH RO YCE. 1 3 1 
 
 shows us the truth. But if we are rational, we can 
 assume such an eternal point of view, can see God 
 everywhere, and can so enter, not merely with mystical 
 longings, but with a clear insight into an immediate com- 
 5 munion with the Lord of all being. And this Lord, he 
 is indeed the author of matter. The earth, the sea, yes, 
 the very geometrical figures themselves write his truth 
 in inanimate outward forms. But meanwhile (and 
 herein lies the hope of our mystical religion) this sub- 
 
 10 stance, this deity, possesses and of its nature determines 
 also and equally an infinite mind, of whose supreme 
 perfection our minds are fragments. We are thus not 
 only the sons of God ; so far as we are wise our lives 
 are hid in God, we are in Him, of Him ; we recognize 
 
 15 this indwelling, we lose our finiteness in Him, we be- 
 come filled with the peace which the eternal brings ; we 
 calm the thirst of our helpless finite passion by enter- 
 ing consciously into his eternal self-possession and free- 
 dom. For the true mind, like the true natural order, 
 
 20 knows nothing of the bondage of time, thinks of no be- 
 fore and after, has no fortune, dreads nothing, laments 
 nothing ; but enjoys its own endlessness, its own com- 
 pleteness, has all things in all things, and so cries, like 
 the lover of the " Imitation," " My Beloved, I am all 
 
 25 thine, and thou art all mine." 
 
 In the fifth part of Spinoza's " Ethics," his own de- 
 scription of the wise man's love of God closes his won- 
 derful exposition. This Jove is superior to fortune, re- 
 nounces all hopes and escapes all fears, feeds alone on 
 
 3 the thought that God's mind is the only mind, loves 
 God with a fragment of " that very love wherewith God 
 loves himself/ 1 The wise man thus wanders on earth 
 
132 THE DOCTRINES OF SPINOZA. 
 
 in whatever state you will, poor, an outcast, weak, near 
 to bodily death ; but " his meditation is not of death, 
 but of life ; " of the eternal life whereof he is a part, 
 and has ever been and ever will be a part. You may 
 bound him in a nut-shell, but he counts himself king 5 
 of infinite space ; and rightly, for the bad dreams of 
 this phantom life have ceased to trouble him. "His 
 blessedness," says Spinoza, " is not the reward of his 
 virtue, but his virtue itself. He rejoices therein, not 
 because he has controlled his lusts ; contrariwise, be- ic 
 cause he rejoices therein, the lusts of the finite have 
 no power over him." " Thus appears how potent, then, 
 is the wise man, and how much he surpasses the igno- 
 rant man, who is driven only by his lusts. For the ig- 
 norant man is not only distracted in various ways by 15 
 external causes, without ever gaining true acquiescence 
 of mind, but moreover lives, as it were, unwitting of 
 himself and of God and of things, and, as soon as he 
 ceases to suffer, ceases also to be. Whereas the wise 
 man, in so far as he is regarded as such, is scarcely at 20 
 all disturbed in spirit, but being conscious of himself 
 and of God and of things, by a certain eternal necessity, 
 never ceases to be, but always possesses true acquies- 
 cence of his spirit. If the way which I have pointed out 
 as leading to this result seems exceedingly hard, it 25 
 may, nevertheless, be discovered. Needs must it be 
 hard since it is so seldom found. How would it be pos- 
 sible if salvation were ready to our hand, and could 
 without great labor be found, that it should be by almost 
 all men neglected ? But all things excellent are as dif- 3 
 ficult as they are rare." 
 
 With these words closes the book of Spinoza's ex- 
 perience. 
 
fit 
 
 peace : Wbat ft i*. 
 
 JOHN FREDERICK DENISON MAURICE. 
 
 1805 1872. 
 
 This sermon on Peace by the Rev. John Frederick Denison 
 Maurice was first preached in Lincoln's Inn Chapel, London, 
 November 13, 1859, the Twenty-first Sunday after Trinity. It 
 has since been reprinted several times, the last and best edition 
 being in the " Lincoln's Inn Sermons " in six volumes, London 
 and New York, 1892, 
 
 It is hardly necessary to call attention to the fact that the style 
 Maurice adopts in expounding this religious doctrine, and the 
 text upon which it is based, is specially intended for oral delivery, 
 and probably loses somewhat in printing. The clear arrangement 
 of the whole is, however, as effective in written as in spoken 
 discourse. 
 
 "Peace I leave imth you, My peace I give unto you : not as the 
 world giveth, give I unto you" JOHN xiv. 27. 
 
 THESE words were spoken to the Apostles on the 
 night of our Lord's betrayal. A few hours after they 
 had received this gift of peace, their souls were in more 
 awful disquietude than they had ever been. They saw 
 5 Him, in Whom they trusted that He should redeem 
 Israel, delivered up to the heathen. Their own rulers 
 condemned Him ; no hosts of Angels appeared to 
 rescue Him ; presently they themselves forsook Him 
 and fled. That last act must have added to all their 
 
 133 
 
I 3 4 PEACE: WHAT IT IS. 
 
 other sorrows the sharpest stings of conscience. They 
 had not only lost Him, but themselves. The Cross 
 and the grave did not separate Him from them so 
 much as the recollection that they had proved false to 
 Him. 5 
 
 How strangely must the thought, " He said, I leave 
 you peace, I give you peace," have mingled with these 
 confusions ! What peace had He bequeathed to 
 them ? Where was it ? How could they claim it ? 
 Nothing seemed further from them than this. Nay, re 
 there was something yet more fearful in their minds : 
 He Who gave them peace, had seemed Himself to lose 
 it. They had seen Him in the Agony of the Garden ; 
 they had heard the cry upon the Cross. Was it not one 
 of conflict and anguish ? Did it not seem as if the if 
 whole world were at war with Him, and as if He were 
 forsaken by His Father ? 
 
 And yet, brethren, these were the very hours which 
 interpreted to the Disciples the words they had heard, 
 but not understood, at the Last Supper; to these they 20 
 must have turned in all their after life, when they would 
 consider the nature and reality and fulness of the bless- 
 ing which our Lord assured to them. 
 
 I. " Peace I leave with you." What ! peace with the 
 people about them, with the rulers of the synagogue, 25 
 with proconsuls or emperors ? He had warned them 
 in this very discourse that all these would carry on 
 with them a continual war. He had come into the 
 world with a sword. His Gospel would divide men 
 asunder, in the same nation, in the same household. 30 
 He had told them this that they might not be offended. 
 It was strange that when they preached of mercy and 
 
JOHN FREDERICK DEN IS ON MA URICE. 1 3 5 
 
 goodwill to men, they should stir up rage and hatred. 
 But He said it would be so, and they found it was so. 
 The peace then which He spoke of must be something 
 different from external ease and quietness. " In the 
 5'world ye shall have tribulation," was part of His legacy. 
 But did it mean that they should have peace within 
 their own circle, if there was war in the world ? For a 
 few months or weeks after the day of Pentecost they 
 might have thought this gift was really theirs. They 
 
 10 had all things common ; they ate their bread with joy 
 and singleness of heart. But soon there arose in that in- 
 fant community heartburnings and hypocrisies ; widows 
 of Greek proselytes murmuring against the Hebrews, 
 because they were neglected in the daily ministration ; 
 
 I 5men and women seeking to deceive men and God by 
 boasting that they had laid the whole price of their pos- 
 sessions at the Apostles' feet when they had kept back 
 a part. Speedily there were debatings about circum- 
 cision ; Apostles separating one from another because 
 
 20 the contention was so sharp between them; St. Paul 
 withstanding St. Peter to the face, because he was to 
 be blamed. By giving peace, our Lord could not mean 
 that they would find all quiet within the chosen body, 
 any more than in the outward world. 
 
 25 Did it mean then freedom from internal conflict, from 
 fierce temptations to pride, self-glorification, to lust, 
 to covetousness, to open sin, to unbelief, to apostasy ? 
 How little St. Paul took it to signify this, these words 
 from the Epistle to the Ephesians may testify : " We 
 
 30 wrestle," he says, "not with flesh and blood, but with 
 principalities and powers, with the rulers of the dark- 
 ness of this world, with spiritual wickedness in high 
 
136 PEACE: WHAT IT 1&. 
 
 places." What description of a battle could you have 
 more terrible than this ? And it is a battle with inter- 
 nal spiritual enemies ; and it is a battle which Apostles 
 had to wage as much as their converts. The peace 
 Christ spoke of must be something else than this, or it r 
 had not been really left, really given, in spite of the 
 words which seemed to witness that it had. 
 
 II. But what wonderful light lay in that clause, " My 
 peace I give unto you " ! As if He had said : " You 
 know, for you have seen, that I was not exempt from 10 
 the contradiction of the world : it hated Me before it 
 hated you. And you know that for your own hearts 
 tell you I was not exempt from the hardness and in- 
 gratitude of true as well as false disciples. I endured 
 misunderstandings, perverseness, desertion, betrayal, 13 
 before you did. And you can remember that while you 
 were sleeping, I was wrestling with unseen enemies, 
 with dreadful temptations. Before you had any ex-, 
 perience of such warfare, I had resisted unto blood. 
 My peace then is not exemption from any of these 20 
 trials ; and if you wish for one, you cannot have the 
 other. But it is precisely that by which I was enabled 
 to pass through these ; to bear the opposition of sin- 
 ners, not to be crushed by the unkindness of friends, 
 to drink the wine-cup to the dregs. That is My peace, 25 
 which can live on in an element of strife, sorrow, help- 
 lessness, even hopelessness ; which can sustain them 
 and rise out of them, proving itself to be mightier. 
 This was My peace, the peace which I had in the 
 Father, My filial union with Him, My filial trust in Him, 30 
 which the darkness of all things around me, of Nature, 
 of human creatures, of My own senses and understand- 
 
JOHN FREDERICK DENIS ON MA URICE. 1 3 7 
 
 ing which I had given up to death, could not extinguish, 
 which survived when My Will could feel only anguish 
 and desertion, first saying, Not Mine, but Thine ; and 
 then giving up the spirit unto the Father's hands. My 
 5 peace I give unto you, this filial union to Him, filial 
 trust in Him Who has revealed Himself to you in Me, 
 Whose love for you is that which I have shown forth 
 in My life and death." 
 
 III. In this way the events that followed the night 
 
 ro of the Passover, which seemed to confute the words 
 that were spoken upon it, will at last have made them 
 clear. But not in this way only ; the sin of the dis- 
 ciples, on that night which more utterly banished peace 
 from their minds than all which they beheld, must it- 
 
 15 self have told them what they had need of, and where 
 it must be sought. They had trusted in themselves, 
 and had found themselves fools ; they had thought 
 they loved their Master, and when love should 
 have flowed forth, it was dry ; then came a bitter 
 
 20 sense of shame and separation; they were indeed 
 alone. But the Lord turned and looked upon them ; 
 the recollection of His love came upon them as it 
 had never come before ; the sense of having slighted 
 it overcame the sense of having dishonored themselves ; 
 
 25 the tears of Peter came i.n place of the remorse of 
 Judas. Then did they know that the peace had been 
 left to them, though till then they had not found it. 
 The love which had been with them so long had not 
 deserted them ; though it seemed to be only an image 
 
 30 reflected from the past, it was indeed near them. It 
 had crushed them ; had broken through their pride ; 
 had called out their sorrow ; if it was dead, then it had 
 
138 PEACE: WHAT IT IS. 
 
 a might even in death. What they had loved was in 
 the grave, but the love was among them more than 
 before, giving them a vision of peace, though all about 
 them and in them seemed at war, a stronger hope 
 than they could realize when He Himself told them 5 
 He should rise again. This love and peace and 
 hope could not be their own ; all that was theii 
 own they had cast away. This was their wonder- 
 ful preparation for that evening when He stood again 
 among them, and said, " Peace be unto you," and ic 
 showed them His hands and His side. They were 
 the old words which they had heard often from Him ; 
 perhaps the salutation with which He welcomed them 
 each morning ; that which they were to bestow upon 
 each house they entered. They were the words which 15 
 had sounded so solemn and strange on the night before 
 the Crucifixion ; they were those of which the savor 
 had been preserved through the hour of their travail ; 
 they were those which met them when they felt that a 
 new man was born into the world. He vanished out 20 
 of their sight ; the gift did not depend upon their power 
 of seeing Him. He had left it with them ; He had 
 given it to them. It was a store to which they might 
 have recourse, not in sunny hours, not when all was 
 cheerful in the world without or within, but in times 25 
 of weariness and desolation. It was a store, not for 
 their eyes, but one for their hearts to feed upon ; it 
 was not one which they could appropriate, it was His 
 peace, not theirs. Yet, as He had said, " I will be with 
 you," they knew that this Peace was with them. It 30 
 might be hidden from them, because He was hidden; 
 but in seeking Him they sought it, in finding Him 
 
JOHN FREDERICK DENISON MA URICE. 139 
 
 they found it. Not as the world giveth them had He 
 given to them. Its gifts are palpable, tangible. And 
 yet we cannot bring them near to ourselves ; we may 
 have them and yet want them. The heart may not be 
 5 able to enjoy them, though the hand grasps them. This 
 has been the continual complaint against the world's 
 gifts. They are good for nothing except as we may 
 make them good. 
 
 " Ours is their wedding garment, ours their shroud." 
 
 They are objects of delight or loathing to us according 
 
 10 to the state we are in. But they have no power to 
 make that state different. They must have a light 
 from within to show their colors by. The colors do not 
 bring the light, and too generally they find none. 
 Therefore men say, " These things were so different 
 
 15 when we were young. How bright they looked once ! 
 How they have faded ! " We all know that it is the eye 
 which has become dimmer ; the things are as they were. 
 Perhaps they never really seemed much brighter ; 
 in youth there may have been other shadows which we 
 
 20 have now forgotten. Only the heart is certain that it 
 ought to enjoy, that it is meant to enjoy, and therefore 
 will persuade itself that it once did enjoy. It has a 
 witness in itself that there is another kind of gift from 
 these, a gift which is directly to the heart,' and not to 
 
 25 the heart only through the eye ; a gift which does 
 not require a particular condition of mind to re- 
 ceive it, but which makes that condition ; a gift 
 that brings the light by which it is contemplated, 
 and then throws light upon all things around ; a gift 
 
 30 which depends upon no accidents, but which compels 
 
140 PEACE: WHAT IT IS. 
 
 accidents to obey it, drawing strength and nourishment 
 from those things which seem most contrary to it. And 
 this gift, which all men know that they want, is that 
 which Christ bestowed upon His disciples. Not one 
 which might be very precious if they had peace of $ 
 mind to entertain it with, but this peace of mind itself. 
 Not a peace of mind which must be produced or kept 
 up by regulating the atmosphere in which it dwells, but 
 which may safely expose itself to all heats and chills, 
 nay, which makes men most conscious of its power 10 
 when they are suffering most from either, or from each 
 in succession. Not a peace of mind which we are to 
 keep, but which is to keep us in the knowledge and 
 love of God and of Jesus Christ our Lord. Here is 
 the mystery of this gift ; here are the tokens that not 15 
 as the world gives, He gives, Who is the Lord of man's 
 inner being, not merely of the circumstances which 
 surround men, though He is Lord of these too, and 
 does dispose and govern them in such wise that they 
 shall all be instruments for the manifestation of Him- 20 
 self, and for the redemption of the creature who is 
 formed in His image. 
 
 IV. Therefore, brethren, though it was fitting that 
 we should consider these words first in their reference 
 to those who heard them first, though the history of 2 5 
 the Apostles illustrates their meaning and force as no 
 other could, they must be ours, or they could not 
 have been theirs. All the gifts which were bestowed 
 upon them at the Passover are ours still. If He gave 
 them the bread, and said, " Take, eat : this is My 3 
 flesh " ; if He poured out the wine, and said, " This 
 is the blood of the New Testament," He imparted 
 
JOHN FREDERICK DENIS ON MA URICE. 1 4 1 
 
 these treasures by them to all generations ; He en- 
 dowed us with them in their names. This gift of peace 
 could not, as I have shown you, have any special ap- 
 plication to the Apostles, merely because the giver was 
 5 sitting visibly before them. It was when He became 
 invisible that they knew what had been imparted to 
 them ; it was when they received it as an invisible 
 blessing. Nor was it theirs because they were stronger 
 or better than others ; only when they knew that they 
 
 50 were as weak and evil as any did they enter into pos- 
 session of it. He chose them to be heralds of His 
 Grace and Peace to mankind ; if they claimed these 
 gifts in their own right, and not as stewards,, the gifts 
 were not realized. To us, then, as truly as to them, 
 
 15 to us upon the same conditions with them, does He 
 say, " Peace I leave with you : My peace I give unto 
 you." Far off as this peace may seem to be from us, 
 it is really nigh at hand to every one of us. We must 
 think we pursue it hither and thither, and it seems 
 
 20 always in advance of us, we do not come up with it. 
 But that which we are pursuing is only a shadow ; the 
 substance from which it is cast is within. The heart 
 cannot find it abroad ; at home the treasure is laid up, 
 though it may be in a chamber we have never visited ; 
 
 25 in one that we have shunned, because we fancy it to be 
 haunted with strange spectres. Haunted it is with 
 these spectres, and greatly they will scare us, when first 
 we venture in. The Disciples were startled when they 
 found what heartlessness and cowardice were in them, 
 
 30 though they had thought themselves ready to die for 
 Him. Such anguish has many a man experienced, 
 when the secret passages of his spirit were suddenly 
 
142 PEACE : WHA T IT )S. 
 
 made known to him. He cannot escape the discovery ; 
 it often comes to him on a sick-bed, when he is least 
 able to face the terrors. But they may be faced ; there 
 is a reward for each one who does not fly from the 
 truth. If he will be humbled by the sight of the dark 5 
 spectres which dwell in the chambers of his soul's im- 
 agery, he will find in them that which is not dark and 
 spectral. He will find the Love, against which the evil 
 in him has been contending, a perfect form of bright- 
 ness and purity which the evil spirits are mocking, and 10 
 which can bid them depart. If he will confess this 
 Presence too; if he will say, not only " I have sinned" 
 but " Against Thee have I sinned ; against Thee, Who 
 hast cared for me, sought for me, striven with me," 
 then a new light will burst upon him. In renouncing J S 
 all his own pretensions to be anything or to have any- 
 thing, he acquires that which is truly his, an inalien- 
 able possession, a treasure in Heaven which thief can- 
 not seize nor moth corrupt. If all our evil lies in re- 
 sistance to a Righteous Being Who is ruling over us, 20 
 then all -good must be a submission to Him. This is 
 Peace, the peace depending on One Who is worthy 
 of our dependence, the peace of not seeking that from 
 outward things which they cannot give, the peace of 
 not seeking that from our own nature which is not in 25 
 it. The Peace is there, in our hearts, but it is there 
 while the heart is seeking its delight in another, while 
 it is forgetting itself. When it finds its object, it is 
 at peace : it cannot be till then. Therefore Christ left 
 this dowry to all human hearts, when He revealed 3 C 
 Himself to them as their proper and ever-present ob- 
 ject ; in them, and above them ; united with them, yet 
 
JOHN FREDERICK DENISON MA URICR. \ 43 
 
 always distinct from them ; blending with them as the 
 sky in the far horizon seems to blend with the sea, as 
 the setting sun seems to share his glory between them. 
 This peace therefore is given to men ; yet He ever 
 5 gives it afresh to them. They have it only while they 
 are content to receive it ; the moment they take it as 
 their property, it is gone. Not as the world gives them, 
 He gives. The world teaches us to claim each thing 
 as our own. It says nothing is ours till we can secure 
 
 ro it against other men. We hold this peace by the op- 
 posite tenure ; we have it only while we care to distrib- 
 ute it, while we seek that every one should share it 
 with us. It is theirs, it is ours, because it is His Who 
 died for all and Who lives for all. 
 
 15 And as this peace was first realized as a deliverance 
 from strife, without and within, so it must be held fast 
 in the midst of the same strife. If ease and sunshine 
 come, it is well ; but we are not to look for them. If 
 joyful sensations are given, if our spirits have an un- 
 
 20 wonted buoyancy and freedom, we are to be thankful ; 
 but to-morrow all this may be changed. If we are pro- 
 voking no hostility, let us ask how that happens ; for 
 the Author of this Peace was a stone of stumbling and 
 a rock of offence ; He was called a friend of publicans 
 
 25 and sinners, and a blasphemer. 
 
 This Peace was given the night before His cruci- 
 fixion. When He rose, the pledges of it were His 
 wounded hands and side. They are always the pledges 
 of it. In the communion of His body and blood, we 
 
 30 are to learn what it is for ourselves, what it is for man- 
 kind. As we partake of that, we confess that it is for 
 the most wretched sons of earth, because it is fixed and 
 eternal in the Heavens. 
 
X. 
 
 $be TReal problem of tbe 
 
 "THE NATION." 
 
 The following editorial from " The Nation," of July 5, 1894, is 
 reprinted by the kind permission of the publisher. 
 
 This statement of one of the problems of practical politics is 
 an example of exposition in a field in which it is largely used, 
 the newspaper editorial. The selection contains also a typical 
 summary of a report in which the important thing is not the 
 style, but the facts. 
 
 IT is pleasant to note that the general nervousness 
 and vague fear of last winter in reference to the unem- 
 ployed have now so largely given way to a season of 
 reflection and analysis. It is no longer enough for 
 a set of men to exhibit themselves as an Army of 5 
 the Unemployed to inspire sympathy or terror in the 
 staid citizen and to make him feel that Congress or 
 the State or city government should " do something." 
 The time has come to cross-examine the unemployed, 
 to ask them how they came into their present evil estate, ic 
 what work they ever did and how they came to lose 
 their jobs, and what work they could or would do now 
 if it were offered them. Such questioning is the surest 
 way to rid ourselves of the notion that there is any- 
 thing new or particularly threatening about the matter 15 
 144 
 
THE NA TION." 145 
 
 as it presents itself to-day, for it is simply the old 
 question over again of what society is to do with the 
 incapable and unwilling who cannot, or will not, earn 
 an honest living. 
 
 We recently had occasion to refer to several interest- 5 
 ing reports from American municipalities and charity 
 organizations, which help to a cool understanding of 
 who the chronic unemployed are and how they came to 
 be so, and now we find strong corroboration of American 
 experience in an article published in the June " Charities 10 
 Review " on " The English Municipalities and the Unem- 
 ployed." The writer, Mr. Edward Porritt, gives a run- 
 ing account of the reports which seventy-three munici- 
 palities made to the Local Government Board in regard 
 to providing work for the unemployed within their 15 
 bounds. The experiment is no novelty in England. 
 Ever since the labor agitators " threw a scare " into the 
 politicians of both parties in 1885, the demands and 
 threats of the unemployed have been steadily intensify- 
 ing, and the Local Government Board has issued a cir-2o 
 cular ever since 1886, urging vestries to give work to 
 idle men. This work was to be of a kind which would 
 not " involve the stigma of pauperism," which " all can 
 perform," which " does not compete with that of other 
 laborers," and " which is not likely to interfere with the 25 
 resumption of regular employment in their own trades 
 by those who seek it." 
 
 The results reported by the seventy-three municipal 
 authorities cannot be claimed by the most enthusiastic 
 advocate of state labor as furnishing any water for his 3 
 mill. In a great majority of the cases the work was 
 unsatisfactorily done and at an increased cost. The 
 10 
 
146 THE REAL PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED. 
 
 Hanover Square vestry for some weeks kept forty men 
 at work repairing roads. The surveyor in charge reports 
 that " the result has been simply to benefit the men 
 employed at an increased expenditure of ,2,000 over 
 the annual estimates for labor and material." The * 
 Hampstead vestry hired snow- sweepers, and they were, 
 reported to be " idle, incapable of hard work, and not 
 amenable to discipline." Carpentering work was offered 
 by the Hackney Board of Works, but the " carpenters 
 struck the first day for trades-union rate of wages." IC 
 Some of the suffering unemployed were offered work at 
 Finchley at fivepence an hour, but declined it on the 
 ground that " their ordinary wage was sixpence." Mr. 
 Porritt sums up by showing how the class of men 
 described in the Government Board circular, " who T 5 
 honestly dread the pauper stigma," do not come within 
 the scope of any of these schemes to provide work by 
 municipalities. One report states that the men be- 
 longed to " the class of permanently unemployed " ; 
 which, says Mr. Porritt, " is the official and English 2a 
 way of stating that they were corner men, loafers." It 
 is also clear from the English experiments that the 
 popular use of the term " unskilled labor " is very 
 inaccurate. 
 
 " According to the reports of the municipal engineers, sewering, 
 road-making, the grading of parks and gardens, and even stone- 
 breaking, gravel-digging, and street-sweeping, cannot any longer 
 be classed as unskilled work. Strength and endurance are 
 needed for all this class of work, and also some degree of skill. 
 Yet in the past it has all been carelessly grouped under the one 
 comprehensive term of unskilled labor, and popularly regarded 
 as work upon which any man may be put if nothing better 01 
 more suitable is offering for him." 
 
THE NA TION." 
 
 '47 
 
 All these investigations show how idle it is to imagine 
 that any amount of work offered by Government or 
 individuals would solve the problem of the permanently 
 unemployed. Mr. Charles Booth, who knows more 
 5 about the London unemployed than any man living, 
 has justly said : " Lack of work is not really the 
 disease ; and the mere provision of it is, therefore, 
 useless as a cure." In a recent address the Reverend 
 Canon Barnett, warden of Toynbee Hall, that home 
 
 10 of Christian socialism, made the following absolutely 
 correct statement : " The unemployed, calmly con- 
 sidered, is not an army of willing workers ; but is 
 rather a body largely made up of those half em- 
 ployed, those unfit for employment, and those unwill- 
 
 15 ing to be employed." It is clear that the real problem, 
 therefore, is not to provide work, but to make men 
 competent and willing to work. But that is a problem 
 as old as civilization, as old as life itself. Nature's 
 remedy is well known. Work or starve is the sharp 
 
 20 dilemma she offers. Society's solution has hitherto 
 been, Support yourself or go to the workhouse, or, if 
 you are diseased or crippled, go to an asylum. The 
 new system of coddling is no improvement. It makes 
 men both more incompetent and more unwilling to 
 
 25 work. If the State is to interfere at all with the opera- 
 tion of natural law in this matter, it should be in the 
 aim to raise incompetence into fitness, to brand un- 
 willingness as a crime. How to do that is the real 
 problem of the unemployed. 
 
XT. 
 
 " Bpple JBtossoms," 
 WILLIAM ARCHER, 1856. 
 
 This summary of one of James Albery's plays, " Apple Bios 
 soms," is from a chapter on Albery in William Archer's " English 
 Dramatists of To-Day," London, 1882. The extract follows 
 a discussion of some of Albery's other plays. 
 
 One of the good points in this summary is the judicious use of 
 quotation, by which the critic conveys an idea, not merely of the 
 plot, but of what is of equal importance in a play, the style. 
 
 WITH all its faults, to use the unavoidable formula, 
 it is a charming and a delicate idyl. Perhaps it would 
 be wiser to avoid that much disputed and much-abused 
 word, and call it a garden-comedy. Its scene, its 
 atmosphere, and its aroma, disarm criticism. We do 5 
 not look for realism under the apple blossoms, in the 
 garden of a village inn of Devonshire, or in the inn- 
 parlor at Christmas-tide, with the holly, to use Tom 
 Penryn's phrase, " speckling the dull corners with 
 quaint lights." The English country inn has a pre- IQ 
 scriptive, half-legendary charm, of which not even its 
 unfortunate relationship to the public-house can en- 
 tirely deprive it. Indeed, the gin-palace is not really 
 of the same family. It is an upstart by-blow of city 
 commerce which has taken the name, and sometimes 15 
 even the arms, of the village aristocrats. The aristo- 
 148 
 
WILLIAM ARCHER. 
 
 149 
 
 crats are dying out along with the modes of life of 
 which they formed a part, but a few specimens still 
 remain, their charm doubled by their rarity. Mr. 
 Albery's inn is one of these : it is called the Apple- 
 5 Tree Inn : it is placed in Devonshire, " the chosen home 
 of chivalry, the garden of romance." Under these 
 circumstances, what churl so wooden-headed as to 
 demand realism and truth ? We want sentiment, we 
 want humor, we want flowers and sunshine, and red 
 
 10 firelight and deep shadows. If we are to have any 
 realism at all let it be of the real pump order, and take 
 the form of real cider and real clotted cream. It is 
 not every day we are at a village inn in Devonshire. 
 Dulce est desipere in loco. 
 
 15 " Apple Blossoms " tells a simple story, so slight 
 that it almost falls to pieces on analysis. Tom Penryn 
 has fallen in love with Jennie Prout of the Apple-Tree 
 Inn. Her uncle and aunt, with whom she lives, not 
 believing that his intentions can be honorable, send to 
 
 20 his father, Captain Penryn, to ask him to get Tom out 
 of the way. Captain Penryn, without even inquiring 
 who the girl is whose happiness Tom is supposed to be 
 endangering, commands him to leave the village. Tom 
 refuses, and the choleric and obstinate old father 
 
 25 promptly disinherits him and casts him off. In the 
 second act we find that Tom has entered the navy as 
 a common sailor, and Captain Penryn has been seized 
 with an illness, through which he has been nursed by 
 Jennie Prout. He has become very much attached to 
 
 30 her, and has practically adopted her. It is Christmas 
 Eve, and in the midst of the preparations for the 
 festivities, Tom arrives in his sailor's dress. He steals 
 
150 ALBERTS " APPLE BLOSSOMS." 
 
 in unnoticed by Jennie, who has just hung up the 
 mistletoe and, sitting under it takes out Tom's portrait 
 in a locket. 
 
 Jennie. I wish you a merry Christmas, and all happiness, and 
 give you the first kiss under the mistletoe. (As she is stooping, 
 TOM takes her hands from behind, and kisses her cheek over her 
 shoulder, then keeps his chin over her head so that she cannot see 
 him.} 
 
 Jennie. Oh, Mr. Temple 1 What a shame 1 (Pause) Isn't it 
 you ? 
 
 Tom (gruffly). No ! 
 Jennie. Then it's Mr. Baggs ? ; 
 Tom. No ! 
 Jennie. Oh, who is it ? 
 
 Tom (sings). " He was there, and I was there " 
 
 Jennie (drops her hands, and pauses a moment in a kind of dreamy 
 wonder, then puts her arms round him). Oh, Tom ! 
 
 Tom (looking round). How pleasant it is to get back to the place 
 you love ! 
 
 Jennie (thinking of him). Yes, it is. 
 Tom. You had my letter ? 
 Jennie. Yes. 
 
 Tom. And no one knows of this but ourselves ? 
 Jennie. Only our Kittie. 
 Tom. Ah, you should not have told. 
 
 Jennie. I was obliged to tell her. Another one wanted to marry 
 me. 
 
 Tom. Who was that ? 
 
 Jennie. Mr. Trebit, the captain at Wheal George. Oh, he is 
 such a funny little man, with a great forehead on a very small 
 
 nose 
 
 Tom. Like a very large entablature on a very little column, eh ? 
 Jennie. Yes ; his nose looks as though it was a temporary nose, 
 put their to support his forehead, while his real nose was in 
 course of erection. 
 
 Tom. Or as if it only marked the proposed site for a nose ? 
 Jennie. But he's plenty of money. 
 
WILLIAM AXCffJSR. 
 
 IS' 
 
 Tom. And I'm so poor, now. 
 Jennie. What am I worth ? 
 
 Tom. Yes, I'm rich. I wouldn't take worlds for you, though I 
 might go out and pick a dozen on any starlight night. 
 
 Jennie. Ah, Tom, stars do nicely to speckle one's talk with, 
 don't they? 
 
 But Tom has come not so much to see Jennie as to 
 get news of his father, of whose illness he had heard. 
 In doing so he has exceeded his leave by three days, 
 and a corporal's squad of sailors is out searching for 
 5 him as a deserter. At the end of the act, in a scene 
 very cleverly arranged so as to get picturesque effects 
 from the changes of light on the stage and over the 
 snowy landscape outside, Captain Penryn refuses to 
 conceal Tom and gives him up to the sailors who are 
 
 10 in search of him. In the third act, Captain Penryn is 
 gradually wasting away under ill-concealed remorse for 
 his harshness, and longing for the return of his only 
 son. The arrival of Tom's ship has been announced, 
 and Bob Prout, Jennie's uncle, has gone to London to 
 
 1 5 try if he can find Tom. On his return, of course un- 
 successful, his wife Kittie, Jennie, and the lawyer, Mr. 
 Temple, are sitting in the apple orchard. 
 
 Kittie. What did you see in London, Bob ? 
 
 Bob. Well, I don't know where to begin. I saw sich a sight o* 
 things. But the first thing I noticed was, that everybody sticks 
 them gashly labels like Mr. Baggs do, awnly they are much beg- 
 gerer, and they're all over the walls an* pailin's and among um I 
 gee waun, a gurt picture of Mr. Baggs, and under et, et said, 
 " Where are you going ? " Then et said, " I'm goin' to see the 
 gurt Baggs at the Gipsey Hall, Pickledilly." 
 
 Kittie. Why, isn't he dead ? 
 
 Bob. Naw, he warn't this morning. 
 
152 ALBERY'S " APPLE BLOSSOMS:* 
 
 Jennie. Ah, his tricks again. 
 
 Kittie. Did you see un, then ? 
 
 Bob. Iss, I did ; and I axed un to tell me a good inn to stop at, 
 and he said Furnival's Inn was the cheapest and best, and axed 
 me to meet un for a game of cricket in Lincoln's Inn Fields in the 
 morning. But it was all es gammuts, agen ; the Inn wasn't a inn, 
 and the Fields was a gurt square. 
 
 Kittie. Ah, you ought to have taken me with you. 
 
 Bob. So I ought. But a wors very kind, and a said he knew 
 the man that kipt the British Museum and the Natural Gallery, 
 and he'd get me in for nawthin' ! 
 
 Temple. Baggs took you in nicely. 
 
 Bob. Aw, that ee did, very nicely, for we went to the Museum 
 and a jist nodded to the man, and a let us in without payin' naw- 
 thin', and we saw everything there is all over the world. Then 
 we went to the Natural Gallery. 
 
 Temple (laughing). And did he just nod his head again? 
 
 Jennie. And you had to pay nawthin' ? 
 
 Bob. No, nawthin' ; and they took ourstecks. A told me that 
 was cos the Prince of Wales had lost es steck ; and they were 
 lookin' to every one's to find it. ... And then he said he'd take 
 me to a theaatreto see a lady and lions, and a ded, and I see the 
 lady. ... 
 
 Kittie. Did ee see the lions, Bob ? 
 
 Bob. Naw. I says to Mr. Baggs, "Where's the lions?" and 
 a ses, ef ee doant caall for un they won't come ; sa I called out 
 for un, and what do you think Mr. Baggs ded ? 
 
 Kittie. I don't know. 
 
 Bob. Why, a pretended a dedn't knaw me, and says, " Turn un 
 out; " and a gashly policeman came and took me away, and Mr. 
 Baggs he helped un, and when we goat outside I thogt he'd a ben 
 ill with laffin, and he took me and gave me a pint of beer! 
 
 Meanwhile, more practical efforts than those of Bob 
 Prout have been made to find Tom and bring him 
 home again. He arrives, is reconciled to his father, 
 and the curtain falls upon him and Jennie singing 
 under the apple-laden branches : 5 
 
WILLIAM ARCHER. 
 
 He was there, and I was there; 
 
 All that I remember now 
 Is the stillness of the air, 
 
 And the blossom on the bough, 
 And the prudish beads I strung : 
 That was when the year was young. 
 
 He was true, and I was true ; 
 
 All that now comes back to me 
 Is the yellow autumn hue, 
 
 And the ripe fruit on the tree? 
 Nothing said, yet all was told, 
 When the year was growing old* 
 
 153 
 
XII. 
 
 TKHottewortb* 
 
 MATTHEW ARNOLD, 1822-1888. 
 
 This piece of literary criticism was first published in 1879 as 
 the preface to " The Poems of Wordsworth," chosen and edited 
 by Matthew Arnold for the "Golden Treasury Series." It has 
 since been reprinted in the Second Series of Arnold's " Essays in 
 Criticism," London, 1891. 
 
 I REMEMBER hearing Lord Macaulay say, after 
 Wordsworth's death, when subscriptions were being 
 collected to found a memorial of him, that ten years 
 earlier more money could have been raised in Cam- 
 bridge alone, to do honor to Wordsworth, than was 5 
 now raised all through the country. Lord Macaulay 
 had, as we know, his own heightened and telling way 
 of putting things, and we must always make allowance 
 for it. But probably it is true that Wordsworth has 
 never, either before or since, been so accepted and j c 
 popular, so established in possession of the minds of 
 all who profess to care for poetry, as he was between 
 the years 1830 and 1840, and at Cambridge. From the 
 very first, no doubt, he had his believers and witnesses. 
 But I have myself heard him declare that, for he knew 15 
 not how many years, his poetry had never brought him ' 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 
 
 155 
 
 in enough to buy his shoe-strings. The poetry-reading 
 public was very slow to recognize him, and was very 
 easily drawn away from him. Scott effaced him with 
 this public, Byron effaced him. 
 
 5 The death of Byron, seemed, however, to make an 
 opening for Wordsworth. Scott, who had for some 
 time ceased to produce poetry himself, and stood 
 before the public as a great novelist ; Scott, too 
 genuine himself not to feel the profound genuineness 
 
 to of Wordsworth, and with an instinctive recognition of 
 his firm hold on nature and of his local truth, always 
 admired him sincerely, and praised him generously. 
 The influence of Coleridge upon young men of ability 
 was then powerful, and was still gathering strength ; 
 
 1 5 this influence told entirely in favor of Wordsworth's 
 poetry. Cambridge was a place where Coleridge's 
 influence had great action, and where Wordsworth's 
 poetry, therefore, flourished especially. But even 
 amongst the general public its sale grew large, the 
 
 20 eminence of its author was widely recognized, and 
 Rydal Mount became an object of pilgrimage. I 
 remember Wordsworth relating how one of the pil- 
 grims, a clergyman, asked him if he had ever written 
 anything besides the " Guide to the Lakes." Yes, he 
 
 25 answered modestly, he had written verses. Not every 
 pilgrim was a reader, but the vogue was established, 
 and the stream of pilgrims came. 
 
 Mr. Tennyson's decisive appearance dates from 
 1842. One cannot say that he effaced Wordsworth 
 
 30 as Scott and Byron had effaced him. The poetry of 
 Wordsworth had been so long before the public, the 
 suffrage of good judges was so steady and so strong 
 
156 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 in its favor, that by 1842 the verdict of posterity, one 
 may almost say, had been already pronounced, arid 
 Wordsworth's English fame was secure. But the 
 vogue, the ear and applause of the great body of 
 poetry-readers, never quite thoroughly perhaps his, he 5 
 gradually lost more and more, and Mr. Tennyson 
 gained them. Mr. Tennyson drew to himself, and 
 away from Wordsworth, the poetry-reading public, and 
 the new generations. Even in 1850, when Words- 
 worth died, this diminution of popularity was visible, I0 
 and occasioned the remark of Lord Macaulay which I 
 quoted at starting. 
 
 The diminution has continued. The influence of 
 Coleridge has waned, and Wordsworth's poetry can no 
 longer draw succor from this ally. The poetry has 15 
 not, however, wanted eulogists ; and it may be said to 
 have brought its eulogists luck, for almost every one 
 who has praised Wordsworth's poetry has praised it 
 well. But the public has remained cold, or, at least, 
 undetermined. Even the abundance of Mr. Palgrave's 20 
 fine and skilfully chosen specimens of Wordsworth, in 
 the " Golden Treasury," surprised many readers, and 
 gave offence to not a few. To tenth-rate critics and 
 compilers, for whom any violent shock to the public 
 taste would be a temerity not to be risked, it is still 25 
 quite permissible to speak of Wordsworth's poetry, not 
 only with ignorance, but with impertinence. On the 
 Continent he is almost unknown. 
 
 I cannot think, then, that Wordsworth has, up to 
 this time, at all obtained his deserts. " Glory," said M. 30 
 Renan the other day, " glory after all is the thing which 
 has the best chance of not being altogether vanity." 
 
MA TTHE IV ARNOLD. \ 5 7 
 
 Wordsworth was a homely man, and himself would 
 certainly never have thought of talking of glory as 
 that which, after all, has the best chance of not being 
 altogether vanity. Yet we may well allow that few 
 5 things are less vain than real glory. Let us conceive 
 of the whole group of civilized nations as being, for 
 intellectual and spiritual purposes, one great confeder- 
 ation, bound to a joint action and working towards a 
 common result ; a confederation whose members have 
 
 10 a due knowledge both of the past, out of which they 
 all proceed, and of one another. This was the ideal 
 of Goethe, and it is an ideal which will impose itself 
 upon the thoughts of our modern societies more and 
 more. Then to be recognized by the verdict of such 
 
 15 a confederation as a master or even as a seriously and 
 eminently worthy workman, in one's own line of intel- 
 lectual or spiritual activity, is indeed glory; a glory 
 which it would be difficult to rate too highly. For 
 what could be more beneficent, more salutary ? The 
 
 20 world is forwarded by having its attention fixed on the 
 best things ; and here is a tribunal, free from all sus- 
 picion of national and provincial partiality, putting a 
 stamp on the best things, and recommending them for 
 general honor and acceptance. A nation, again, is 
 
 25 furthered by recognition of its real gifts and successes ; 
 it is encouraged to develop them further. And here 
 is an honest verdict, telling us which of our supposed 
 successes are really, in the judgment of the great im- 
 partial world, and not in our own private judgment 
 
 30 only, successes, and which are not. 
 
 It is so easy to feel pride and satisfaction in one's 
 own things, so hard to make sure that one is right in 
 
158 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 feeling it! We have a great empire. "But so had 
 Nebuchadnezzar. We extol the " unrivalled happiness " 
 of our national civilization. But then comes a candid 
 friend, and remarks that our upper class is material- 
 ized, our middle class vulgarized, and our lower class 5 
 brutalized. We are proud of our painting, our music. 
 But we find that in the judgment of other people our 
 painting is questionable, and our music non-existent. 
 We are proud of our men of science. And here it 
 turns out that the world is with us ; we find that in the ic 
 judgment of other people, too, Newton among the 
 dead, and Mr. Darwin among the living, hold as high 
 a place as they hold in our national opinion. 
 
 Finally, we are proud of our poets and poetry. Now 
 poetry is nothing less than the most perfect speech of 15 
 man, that in which he comes nearest to being able to 
 utter the truth. It is no small thing, therefore, to 
 succeed eminently in poetry. And so much is required 
 for duly estimating success here, that about poetry it 
 is perhaps hardest to arrive at a sure general verdict, 20 
 and takes longest. Meanwhile, our own conviction of 
 the superiority of our national poets is not decisive, is 
 almost certain to be mingled, as we see constantly in 
 English eulogy of Shakespeare, with much of provin- 
 cial infatuation. And we know what was the opinion 2 5 
 current amongst our neighbors the French people of 
 taste, acuteness, and quick literary tact not a hun- 
 dred years ago, about our great poets. The old " Bio- 
 graphie Universelle " notices the pretension of the Eng- 
 lish to a place for their poets among the chief poets of 3 
 the world, and says that this is a pretension which to 
 no one but an Englishman can ever seem admissible. 
 
MATTtfEW ARNOLD. 
 
 '59 
 
 And the scornful, disparaging things said by foreigners 
 about Shakespeare and Milton, and about our national 
 over-estimate of them, have been often quoted, and 
 will be in every one's remembrance. 
 5 A great change has taken place, and Shakespeare 
 is now generally recognized, even in France, as one 
 of the greatest of poets. Yes, some anti-Gallican 
 cynic will say, the French rank him with Corneille and 
 with Victor Hugo ! But let me have the pleasure of 
 
 10 quoting a sentence about Shakespeare, which I met 
 with by accident not long ago in the " Correspondant " 
 a French review which not a dozen English people, I 
 suppose, look at. The writer is praising Shakespeare's 
 prose. With Shakespeare, he says, " prose comes in 
 
 15 whenever the subject, being more familiar, is unsuited 
 to the majestic English iambic." And he goes on : 
 " Shakespeare is the king of poetic rhythm and style, 
 as well as the king of the realm of thought ; along with 
 his dazzling prose, Shakespeare has succeeded in giv- 
 
 20 ing us the most varied, the most harmonious verse 
 which has ever sounded upon the human ear since the 
 verse of the Greeks." M. Henry Cochin, the writer of 
 this sentence, deserves our gratitude for it ; it would 
 not be easy to praise Shakespeare, in a single sentence, 
 
 25 more justly. And when a foreigner and a Frenchman 
 writes thus of Shakespeare, and when Goethe says of 
 Milton, in whom there was so much to repel Goethe 
 rather than to attract him, that " nothing has been ever 
 done so entirely in the sense of the Greeks as l Samson 
 
 3 Agonistes,' and that " Milton is in very truth a poet 
 whom we must treat with all reverence," then we un- 
 derstand what constitutes a European recognition of 
 
*6o WORDSWORTH. 
 
 poets and poetry as contradistinguished from a merely 
 national recognition, and that in favor both of Milton 
 and of Shakespeare the judgment of the high court of 
 appeal has finally gone. 
 
 I come back to M. Kenan's praise of glory, from 5 
 which I started. Yes, real glory is a most serious 
 thing, glory authenticated by the Amphictyonic Court 
 of final appeal, definitive glory. And even for poets 
 and poetry, long and difficult as may be the process cf 
 arriving at the right award, the right award comes at 10 
 last, the definitive glory rests where it is deserved. 
 Every establishment of such a real glory is good and 
 wholesome for mankind at large, good and wholesome 
 for the nation which produced the poet crowned with 
 it. To the poet himself it can seldom do harm ; for 15 
 he, poor man, is in his grave, probably, long before his 
 glory crowns him. 
 
 Wordsworth has been in his grave for some thirty 
 years, and certainly his lovers and admirers cannot 
 flatter themselves that this great and steady light of 20 
 glory as yet shines over him. He is not fully recog- 
 nized at home ; he is not recognized at all abroad. 
 Yet I firmly believe that the poetical performance of 
 Wordsworth is, after that of Shakespeare and Milton, 
 of which all the world now recognizes the worth, un- 2 5 
 doubtedly the most considerable in our language from 
 the Elizabethan age to the present time. Chaucer is 
 anterior ; and on other grounds, too, he cannot well 
 be brought into the comparison. But taking the roll 
 of our chief poetical names, besides Shakespeare and 3 
 Milton, from the age of Elizabeth downwards, and 
 going through it, Spenser, Dryden, Pope, Gray, Gold- 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 1 6 1 
 
 smith, Cowper, Burns, Coleridge, Scott, Campbell, 
 Moore, Byron, Shelley, Keats (I mention those only 
 who are dead), I think it certain that Wordsworth's 
 name deserves to stand, and will finally stand, above 
 5 them all. Several of the poets named have gifts and 
 excellences which Wordsworth has not. But taking 
 the performance of each as a whole, I say that Words- 
 worth seems to me to have left a body of poetical 
 work superior in power, in interest, in the qualities 
 
 10 which give enduring freshness, to that which any one 
 of the others has left. 
 
 But this is not enough to say. I think it certain, 
 further, that if we take the chief poetical names of the 
 Continent since the death of Moliere, and, omitting 
 
 15 Goethe, confront the remaining names with that of 
 Wordsworth, the result is the same. Let us take 
 Klopstock, Lessing, Schiller, Uhland, Riickert, and 
 Heine for Germany ; Fiiicaia, Alfieri, Manzoni, and 
 Leopard! for Italy ; Racine, Boileau, Voltaire, Andre' 
 
 20 Chenier, Beranger, Lamartine, Musset, M. Victor 
 Hugo (he has been so long celebrated that although 
 he still lives I may be permitted to name him) for 
 France. Several of these, again, have evidently gifts 
 and excellences to which Wordsworth can make no 
 
 25 pretension. But in real poetical achievement it seems 
 to me indubitable that to Wordsworth, here again, 
 belongs the palm. It seems to me that Wordsworth 
 has left behind him a body of poetical work which 
 wears, and will wear, better on the whole than the 
 
 30 performance of any one of these personages, so far 
 more brilliant and celebrated, most of them, than the 
 homely poet of Rydal. Wordsworth's performance in 
 ii 
 
162 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 poetry is on the whole, in power, in interest, in the 
 qualities which give enduring freshness, superior to 
 theirs. 
 
 This is a high claim to make for Wordsworth. But 
 if it is a just claim, if Wordsworth's place among the 5 
 poets who have appeared in the last two or three cen 
 turies is after Shakespeare, Moliere, Milton, Goethe, 
 indeed, but before all the rest, then in time Words- 
 worth will have his due. We shall recognize him in 
 his place, as we recognize Shakespeare and Milton ; 10 
 and not only we ourselves shall recognize him, but he 
 will be recognized by Europe also. Meanwhile, those 
 who recognize him already may do well, perhaps, to 
 ask themselves whether there are not in the case of 
 Wordsworth certain special obstacles which hinder or 15 
 delay his due recognition by others, and whether these 
 obstacles are not in some measure removable. 
 
 The " Excursion " and the " Prelude," his poems of 
 greatest bulk, are by no means Wordsworth's best work. 
 His best work is in his shorter pieces, and many 20 
 indeed are there of these which are of first-rate excel- 
 lence. But in his seven volumes the pieces of high 
 merit are mingled with a mass of pieces very inferior 
 to them ; so inferior to them that it seems wonderful 
 how the same poet should have produced both. Shake- 25 
 speare frequently has lines and passages in a strain 
 quite false, and which are entirely unworthy of him. 
 But one can imagine his smiling if one could meet him 
 in the Elysian Fields and tell him so ; smiling and 
 replying that he knew it perfectly well himself, and 30 
 what did it matter ? But with Wordsworth the case is 
 different. Work altogether inferior, work quite unin- 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 1 63 
 
 spired, flat and dull, is produced by him with evident 
 unconsciousness of its defects, and he presents it to us 
 with the same faith and seriousness as his best work. 
 Now a drama or an epic fill the mind, and one does 
 
 5 not look beyond them ; but in a collection of short 
 pieces the impression made by one piece requires to 
 be continued and sustained by the piece following. 
 In reading Wordsworth the impression made by one 
 of his fine pieces is too often dulled and spoiled by a 
 
 10 very inferior piece coming after it. 
 
 Wordsworth composed verses during a space of 
 some sixty years ; and it is no exaggeration to say that 
 within one single decade of those years, between 1798 
 and 1808, almost all his really first-rate work was 
 
 1 5 produced. A mass of inferior work remains, work 
 done before and after this golden prime, imbedding 
 the first-rate work and clogging it, obstructing our 
 approach to it, chilling, not unfrequently, the high- 
 wrought mood with which we leave it. To be recog- 
 
 20 nized far and wide as a great poet, to be possible and 
 receivable as a classic, Wordsworth needs to be re- 
 lieved of a great deal of the poetical baggage which 
 now encumbers him. To administer this relief is in- 
 dispensable, unless he is to continue to be a poet for 
 
 25 the few only, a poet valued far below his real worth 
 by the world. 
 
 There is another thing. Wordsworth classified his 
 poems not according to any commonly received plan 
 of arrangement, but according to a scheme of mental 
 
 30 physiology. He has poems of the fancy, poems of the 
 imagination, poems of sentiment and reflection, and so 
 OH. His categories are ingenious but far-fetched, and 
 
T 64 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 the lesult of his employment of them is unsatisfactory. 
 Poems are separated one from another which possess 
 a kinship of subject or of treatment far more vital and 
 deep than the supposed unity of mental origin, which 
 was Wordsworth's reason for joining them with others. 5 
 
 The tact of the Greeks in matters of this kind was 
 infallible. We may rely upon it that we shall not im- 
 prove upon the classification adopted by the Greeks 
 for kinds of poetry ; that their categories of epic, dra- 
 matic, lyric, and so forth, have a natural propriety, and ia 
 should be adhered to. It may sometimes seem doubt- 
 ful to which of two categories a poem belongs ; whether 
 this or that poem is to be called, for instance, narra- 
 tive or lyric, lyric or elegiac. But there is to be found 
 in every good poem a strain, a predominant note, T S 
 which determines the poem as belonging to one of 
 these kinds rather than the other ; and here is the 
 best proof of the value of the classification, and of the 
 advantage of adhering to it. Wordsworth's poems 
 will never produce their due effect until they are freed 2 
 from their present artificial arrangement, and grouped 
 more naturally. 
 
 Disengaged from the quantity of inferior work which 
 now obscures them, the best poems of Wordsworth, I 
 hear many people say, would indeed stand out in great 2 S 
 beauty, but they would prove to be very few in num- 
 ber, scarcely more than half a dozen. I maintain, on 
 the other hand, that what strikes me with admiration, 
 what establishes in my opinion Wordsworth's supe- 
 riority, is the great and ample body of powerful work 3 
 which remains to him, even after all his inferior work 
 has been cleared away. He gives us so much to rest 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 1 65 
 
 upon, so much which communicates his spirit and 
 engages ours ! 
 
 This is of very great importance. If it were a com- 
 parison of single pieces, or of three or four pieces, by 
 5 each poet, I do not say that Wordsworth would stand 
 decisively above Gray, or Burns, or Coleridge, or 
 Keats, or Manzoni, or Heine. It is in his amplei 
 body of powerful work that I find his superiority. 
 His good work itself, his work which counts, is not all 
 
 10 of it, of course, of equal value. Some kinds of poetry 
 are in themselves lower kinds than others. The ballad 
 kind is a lower kind ; the didactic kind, still more, is a 
 lower kind. Poetry of this latter sort counts, too, 
 sometimes, by its biographical interest partly, not by 
 
 15 its poetical interest pure and simple ; but then this can 
 only be when the poet producing it has the power and 
 importance of Wordsworth, a power and importance 
 which he assuredly did not establish by such didactic 
 poetry alone. Altogether, it is, I say, by the great 
 
 20 body of powerful and significant work which remains 
 to him, after every reduction and deduction has been 
 made, that Wordsworth's superiority is proved. 
 
 To exhibit this body of Wordsworth's best work, to 
 clear away obstructions from around it, and to let it 
 
 25 speak for itself, is what every lover of Wordsworth 
 should desire. Until this has been done, Words- 
 worth, whom we, to whom he is dear, all of us know 
 and feel ^to be so great a poet, has not had a fair 
 chance before the world. When once it has been 
 
 30 done, he will make his way best, not by our advocacy 
 of him, but by his own worth and power. We may 
 safely leave him to make his way thus, we who believe 
 
1 66 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 that a superior worth and power in poetry finds in 
 mankind a sense responsive to it and disposed at last 
 to recognize it. Yet at the outset, before he has been 
 duly known and recognized, we may do Wordsworth 
 a service, perhaps, by indicating in what his superior 5 
 power and worth will be found to consist, and in what 
 it will not. 
 
 Long ago, in speaking of Homer, I said that the 
 noble and profound application of ideas to life is the 
 most essential part of poetic greatness. I said that a 10 
 great poet receives his distinctive character of supe- 
 riority from his application, under the conditions im- 
 mutably fixed by the laws of poetic beauty and poetic 
 truth, from his application, I say, to his subject, what- 
 ever it may be, of the ideas 15 
 
 " On man, on nature, and on human life,' 
 
 which he has acquired for himself. The line quoted 
 is Wordsworth's own ; and his superiority arises from 
 his powerful use, in his best pieces, his powerful appli- 
 cation to his subject, of ideas " on man, on nature, and 
 on human life." 20 
 
 Voltaire, with his signal acuteness, most truly re- 
 marked that " no nation has treated in poetry moral 
 ideas with more energy and depth than the English 
 nation." And he adds : " There, it seems to me, is the 
 great merit of the English poets." Voltaire does not 25 
 mean, by "treating in poetry moral ideas," the compos- 
 ing moral and didactic poems ; that brings us but a 
 very little way in poetry. He means just the same 
 thing as was meant when I spoke above " of the noble 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 167 
 
 and profound application of ideas to life " ; and he 
 means the application of these ideas under the condi- 
 tions fixed for us by the laws of poetic beauty and 
 poetic truth. If it is said that to call these ideas 
 5 moral ideas is to introduce a strong and injurious lim- 
 itation, I answer that it is to do nothing of the kind, 
 because moral ideas are really so main a part of human 
 life. The question, how to live, is itself a moral idea ; 
 and it is the question which most interests every man, 
 10 and with which, in some way or other, he is perpetually 
 occupied. A large sense is of course to be given to 
 the term moral. Whatever bears upon the question, 
 "how to live," comes under it. 
 
 " Nor love thy life, nor hate ; but, what thou liv'st, 
 Live well ; how long or short, permit to heaven." 
 
 In those fine lines Milton utters, as every one at once 
 1 5 perceives, a moral idea. Yes, but so too, when Keats 
 consoles the forward-bending lover on the Grecian Urn. 
 the lover arrested and presented in immortal relief by 
 the sculptor's hand before he can kiss, with the line, 
 
 " Forever wilt thou love, and she be fair "- 
 he utters a moral idea. When Shakespeare says, that 
 
 " We are such stuff 
 
 As dreams are made of, and our little life 
 Is rounded with a sleep," 
 
 20 he utters a moral idea. 
 
 Voltaire was right in thinking that the energetic and 
 profound treatment of moral ideas, in this large sense, 
 is what distinguishes the English poetry. He sincerely 
 
1 68 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 meant praise, not dispraise or hint of limitation ; and 
 they err who suppose that poetic limitation is a neces- 
 sary consequence of the fact, the fact being granted as 
 Voltaire states it. If what distinguishes the greatest 
 poets is their powerful and profound application of 5 
 ideas to life, which surely no good critic will deny, 
 then to prefix to the term ideas here the term moral 
 makes hardly any difference, because human life itself 
 is in so preponderating a degree moral. 
 
 It is important, therefore, to hold fast to this : that 10 
 poetry is at bottom a criticism of life ; that the great- 
 ness of a poet lies in his powerful and beautiful appli- 
 i cation of ideas to life, to the question : How to live. 
 Morals are often treated in a narrow and false fashion ; 
 /, ,they are bound up with systems of thought and belief r 5 
 
 which have had their day ; they are fallen into the 
 1 hands of pedants and professional dealers ; they grow 
 U tiresome to some of us. We find attraction, at times, 
 even in a poetry of revolt against them ; in a poetry 
 which might take for its motto Omar Kheyam's words : 20 
 " Let us make up in the tavern for the time which we 
 have wasted in the mosque." Or we find attractions 
 in a poetry indifferent to them ; in a poetry where the 
 contents may be what they will, but where the form is 
 studied and exquisite. We delude ourselves in either 25 
 case ; and the best cure for our delusion is to let our 
 minds rest upon that great and inexhaustible word life^ 
 until we learn to enter into its meaning. A poetry of 
 revolt against moral ideas is a poetry of revolt against 
 life; a poetry of indifference towards moral ideas is a 30 
 poetry of indifference towards life. 
 
 Epictetus had a happy figure for things like the 
 
c 
 
 MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 1 69 
 
 play of the senses, or literary form and finish, or argu- 
 mentative ingenuity, in comparison with " the best and 
 master thing " for us, as he called it, the concern, how 
 to live. Some people were afraid of them, he said, or 
 5 they disliked and undervalued them. Such people 
 were wrong ; they were unthankful or cowardly. But 
 the things might also be over-prized, and treated as 
 final when they are not. They bear to life the relation 
 which inns bear to home. " As if a man, journeying 
 
 10 home, and finding a nice inn on the road, and liking 
 it, were to stay forever at the inn ! Man, thou hast 
 forgotten thine object ; thy journey was not to this, 
 but through this. ' But this inn is taking/ And how 
 many other inns, too, are taking, and how many fields 
 
 1 5 and meadows ! but as places of passage merely. You 
 have an object, which is this : to get home, to do your 
 duty to your family, friends, and fellow-countrymen, to 
 attain inward freedom, serenity, happiness, content- 
 ment. Style takes your fancy, arguing takes your 
 
 20 fancy, and you forget your home and want to make 
 your abode with them and to stay with them, on the 
 plea that they are taking. Who denies that they are 
 taking ? but as places of passage, as inns. And when 
 I say this, you suppose me to be attacking the care for 
 
 35 style, the care for argument. I am not ; I attack the 
 resting in them, the not looking to the end which is 
 beyond them." 
 
 Now, when we come across a poet like Thdophile 
 Gautier, we have a poet who has taken up his abode 
 
 30 at an inn, and never got farther. There may be in- 
 ducements to this or that one of us, at this or that 
 moment, to find delight in him, to cleave to him ; but 
 
I 7 o 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 after all, we do not change the truth about him, we 
 only stay ourselves in his inn along with him.' And 
 when we come across a poet like Wordsworth, who 
 sings 
 
 " Of truth, of grandeur, beauty, love and hope, 
 And melancholy fear subdued by faith, 
 Of blessed consolations in distress, 
 Of moral strength and intellectual power, 
 Of joy in widest commonalty spread " 
 
 then we have a poet intent on " the best and master 5 
 thing," and who prosecutes his journey home. We 
 say, for brevity's sake, that he deals with life, because 
 he deals with that in which life really consists. This 
 is what Voltaire means to praise in the English poets, 
 this dealing with what is really life. But always it io 
 is the mark of the greatest poets that they deal with it ; 
 and to say that the English poets are remarkable for 
 dealing with it, is only another way of saying, what is 
 true, that in poetry the English genius has especially 
 shown its power. 15 
 
 Wordsworth deals with it, and his greatness lies in 
 his dealing with it so powerfully. I have named a 
 number of celebrated poets above all of whom he, in 
 my opinion, deserves to be placed. He is to be placed 
 above poets like Voltaire, Dryden, Pope, Lessing, 20 
 Schiller, because these famous personages, with a 
 thousand gifts and merits, never, or scarcely ever, 
 attain the distinctive accent and utterance of the high 
 and genuine poets 
 
 " Quique pii vates et Phoebo digna locuti," 
 at all. Burns, Keats, Heine, not to speak of others 25 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 
 
 171 
 
 in our list, have this accent ; who can doubt it ? 
 And at the same time they have treasures of humor, 
 felicity, passion, for which in Wordsworth we shall look 
 in vain. Where, then, is Wordsworth's superiority ? 
 5 It is here ; he deals with more of life than they do ; ^ 
 he deals with life, as a whole, more powerfully. 
 
 No Wordsworthian will doubt this. Nay, the fervent 
 Wordsworthian will add, as Mr. Leslie Stephen does, 
 that Wordsworth's poetry is precious because his phi- 
 
 ro losophy is sound ; that his " ethical system is as dis- 
 tinctive and capable of exposition as Bishop Butler's "; 
 that his poetry is informed by ideas which "fall spon- "' 
 taneously into a scientific system of thought." But 
 we must be on our guard against the Wordsworthians, 
 
 15 if we want to secure for Wordsworth his due rank as 
 a poet.- The Wordsworthians are apt to praise him for 
 the wrong things, and to lay far too much stress upon 
 what they call his philosophy. His poetry is the 
 reality, his philosophy, so far, at least, as it may put 
 
 20 on the form and habit of " a scientific system of 
 thought," and the more that it puts them on, is the 
 illusion. Perhaps we shall one day learn to make this 
 proposition general, and to say : Poetry is the reality, 
 philosophy the illusion. But in Wordsworth's case, at 
 
 15 any rate, we cannot do him justice until we dismiss his 
 formal philosophy. 
 
 The " Excursion " abounds with philosophy, and there- 
 fore the " Excursion " is to the Wordsworthian what it 
 never can be to the disinterested lover of poetry, a 
 
 30 satisfactory work. " Duty exists," says Wordsworth, 
 in the " Excursion," and then he proceeds thus 
 
172 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 "... Immutably survive, 
 For our support, the measures and the forms, 
 Which an abstract Intelligence supplies, 
 Whose kingdom is, where time and space are not." 
 
 And the Wordsworthian is delighted, and thinks that 
 here is a sweet union of philosophy and poetry. But 
 the disinterested lover of poetry will feel that the lines 
 carry us really not a step farther than the proposition 
 which they would interpret ; that they are a tissue of 5 
 elevated but abstract verbiage, alien to the very nature 
 of poetry. 
 
 Or let us come direct to the centre of Wordsworth's 
 philosophy, as " an ethical system, as distinctive and 
 capable of systematical exposition as Bishop Butler's " 10 
 
 "... One adequate support 
 For the calamities of mortal life 
 Exists, one only ; an assured belief 
 That the procession of our fate, howe'er 
 Sad or disturbed, is ordered by a Being 
 Of infinite benevolence and power ; 
 Whose everlasting purposes embrace 
 All accidents, converting them to good." 
 
 That is doctrine such as we hear in church too, reli- 
 gious and philosophic doctrine ; and the attached 
 Wordsworthian loves passages of such doctrine x and 
 brings them forward in proof of his poet's excellence. 
 But however true the doctrine may be, it has, as here 15 
 presented, none of the characters of poetic truth, the . 
 kind of truth which we require from a poet, and in 
 which Wordsworth is really strong. 
 
 Even the " intimations " of the famous Ode, those 
 corner-stones of the supposed philosophic system of 20 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 173 
 
 Wordsworth, the idea of the high instincts and affec- 
 tions coming out in childhood, testifying of a divine 
 home recently left, and fading away as our life proceeds, 
 this idea, of undeniable beauty as a play of fancy, has 
 5 itself not the character of poetic truth of the best kind ; 
 it has no real solidity. The instinct of delight in 
 Nature and her beauty had no doubt extraordinary 
 strength in Wordsworth himself as a child. But to 
 say that universally this instinct is mighty in child- 
 
 10 hood, and tends to die away afterwards, is to say what 
 is extremely doubtful. In many people, perhaps with 
 the majority of educated persons, the love of nature is 
 nearly imperceptible at ten years old, but strong and 
 operative at thirty. In general we may say of these 
 
 1 5 high instincts of early childhood, the base of the alleged 
 systematic philosophy of Wordsworth, what Thucydides 
 says of the early achievements of the Greek race : 
 " It is impossible to speak with certainty of what is 
 so remote ; but from all that we can really investigate, 
 
 20 1 should say that they were no very great things." 
 
 Finally, the " scientific system of thought " in Words- 
 worth gives us at last such poetry as this, which the 
 devout Wordsworthian accepts 
 
 " O for the coming of that glorious time 
 
 When, prizing knowledge as her noblest wealth 
 
 And best protection, this Imperial Realm, 
 
 While she exacts allegiance, shall admit 
 
 An obligation, on her part, to teach 
 
 Them who are born to serve her and obey; 
 
 Binding herself by statute to secure, 
 
 For all the children whom her soil maintains, 
 
 The rudiments of letters, and inform 
 
 The mind with moral and religious truth." 
 
174 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 Wordsworth calls Voltaire dull, and surely the produc- 
 tion of these un-Voltairian lines must have been imposed 
 on him as a judgment ! One can hear them being 
 quoted at a Social Science Congress ; one can call up 
 the whole scene. A great room in one of our dismal 5 
 provincial towns; dusty air and jaded afternoon day- 
 light ; benches full of men with bald heads and women 
 in spectacles ; an orator lifting up his face from a 
 manuscript written within and without to declaim 
 these lines of Wordsworth ; and in the soul of any poor 10 
 child of nature who may have wandered in thither, an- 
 unutterable sense of lamentation, and mourning, and 
 woe ! 
 
 " But turn we," as Wordsworth says, " from these 
 bold, bad men," the haunters of Social Science Con- 15 
 gresses. And let us be on our guard, too, against the 
 exhibitors and extollers of a " scientific system of 
 thought " in Wordsworth's poetry. The poetry will 
 never be seen aright while they thus exhibit it. The 
 cause of its greatness is simple, and may be told quite 20 
 simply. Wordsworth's poetry is great because of the 
 ' extraordinary power with which Wordsworth feels the 
 /, . joy offered to us in nature, the joy offered to us in the 
 /X simple primary affections and duties ; and because of 
 the extraordinary power with which, in case after case, 25 
 he shows us this joy, and renders it so as to make us 
 share it. 
 
 The source of joy from which he thus draws is the 
 truest and most unfailing source of joy accessible to 
 man. It is also accessible universally. Wordsworth 30 
 brings us word, therefore, according to his own strong 
 and characteristic line, he brings us word 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 1 7 5 
 
 " Of joy in widest commonalty spread." 
 
 Here is an immense advantage for a poet. Words- 
 worth tells of what all seek, and tells of it at its truest 
 and best source, and yet a source where all may go 
 and draw for it. 
 
 5 Nevertheless, we are not to suppose that everything 
 is precious which Wordsworth, standing even at this 
 perennial and beautiful source, may give us. Words- 
 worthians are apt to talk as if it must be. They will 
 speak with the same reverence of " The Sailor's Mother," 
 
 10 for example, as of "Lucy Gray." They do their master 
 harm by such lack of discrimination. " Lucy Gray " is 
 a beautiful success ; " The Sailor's Mother " is a failure. 
 To give aright what he wishes to give, to interpret and 
 render successfully, is not always within Wordsworth's 
 
 15 own command. It is within no poet's command ; here 
 is the part of the Muse, the inspiration, the God, the 
 " not ourselves." In Wordsworth's case, the accident, 
 for so it may almost be called, of inspiration, is of 
 peculiar importance. No poet, perhaps, is so evi- 
 
 20 dently filled with a new and sacred energy when the 
 inspiration is upon him ; no poet, when it fails him, is 
 so left " weak as is a breaking wave." I remember 
 hearing him say that " Goethe's poetry was not inevi- 
 table enough." The remark is striking and true ; no 
 
 *5 line in Goethe, as Goethe said himself, but its maker 
 knew well how it came there. Wordsworth is right, 
 Goethe's poetry is not inevitable ; not inevitable 
 enough. But Wordsworth's poetry, when he is at his 
 best, is inevitable, as inevitable as Nature herself. It 
 
 30 might seem that Nature not only gave him the matter 
 
176 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 for his poem, but wrote his poem for him. He has no 
 style. He was too conversant with Milton not to 
 catch at times his master's manner, and he has fine 
 Miltonic lines ; but he has no assured poetic style of 
 his own, like Milton. When he seeks to have a style 5 
 -> he falls into ponderosity and pomposity. In the " Ex- 
 cursion " we have his style, as an artistic product of his 
 own creation ; and although Jeffrey completely failed 
 to recognize Wordsworth's real greatness, he was yet 
 not wrong in saying of the " Excursion," as a work of 10 
 i poetic style : " This will never do." And yet magical 
 
 as is that power, which Wordsworth has not, of assured 
 and possessed poetic style, he has something which is 
 an equivalent for it. 
 
 Every one who has any sense for these things feels 15 
 the subtle turn, the heightening, which is given to a 
 
 1 poet's verse by his genius for style. We can feel it in 
 
 {r. the 
 
 "After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well " 
 of Shakespeare ; in the 
 
 "... though fall'n on evil days, 
 On evil days though falPn, and evil tongues " 
 
 of Milton. It is the incomparable charm of Milton's 20 
 power of poetic style which gives such worth to " Para- 
 dise Regained," and makes a great poem of a work 
 in which Milton's imagination does not soar high. 
 Wordsworth has in constant possession, and at com- 
 mand, no style of this kind; but he had too poetic a 25 
 nature, and had read the great poets too well, not to 
 catch, as I have already remarked, something of it 
 occasionally. We find it not only in his Miltonic 
 
MA TTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 177 
 
 lines ; we find it in such a phrase as this, where the 
 manner is his own, not Milton's 
 
 " . . . the fierce confederate storm 
 Of sorrow barricaded evermore 
 Within the walls of cities ; " 
 
 although even here, perhaps, the power of style, which 
 is undeniable, is more properly that of eloquent prose 
 5 than the subtle heightening and change wrought by 
 genuine poetic style. It is style, again, and the eleva- 
 tion given by style, which chiefly makes the effective- 
 ness of " Laodameia." Still the right sort of verse to 
 choose from Wordsworth, if we are to seize his true 
 10 and most characteristic form of expression, is a line 
 like this from " Michael " 
 
 " And never lifted up a single stone." 
 
 There is nothing subtle in it, no heightening, no study 
 of poetic style, strictly so called, at all ; yet it is ex- 
 pression of the highest and most truly expressive kind. 
 15 Wordsworth owed much to Burns, and a style of 
 perfect plainness, relying for effect solely on the weight 
 and force of that which with entire fidelity it utters, 
 Burns could show him. 
 
 " The poor inhabitant below 
 
 Was quick to learn and wise to know 
 And keenly felt the friendly glow 
 
 And softer flame ; 
 But thoughtless follies laid him low 
 
 And stained his name." 
 
 Every one will be conscious of a likeness here to 
 
 20 Wordsworth ; and if Wordsworth did great things with 
 
 this nobly plain manner, we must remember, what 
 
 12 
 
178 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 indeed he himself would always have been forward to 
 acknowledge, that Burns used it before him. 
 / Still Wordsworth's use of it has something unique 
 fa and unmatchable. Nature herself seems, I say, to take 
 the pen out of his hand, and to write for him with her r 
 own bare, sheer, penetrating power. This arises from 
 two causes ; from the profound sincereness with which 
 Wordsworth feels his subject, and also from the pro- 
 TI foundly sincere and natural character of his subject 
 itself. He can and will treat such a subject with ic 
 nothing but the most plain, first-hand, almost austere 
 naturalness. His expression may often be called bald, 
 as, for instance, in the poem of " Resolution and Inde- 
 pendence " but it is bald as the bare mountain tops are 
 bald, with a baldness which is full of grandeur. 15 
 
 Wherever we meet with the successful balance, in 
 W T ords\vorth, of profound truth of subject with pro- 
 found truth of execution, he is unique. His best 
 poems are those which most perfectly exhibit this bal- 
 ance. I have a warm admiration for " Laodameia " and 20 
 for the great " Ode " but if I am to tell the very truth, I 
 find " Laodameia "-not wholly free from something artifi- 
 cial, and the great " Ode" not wholly free from some- 
 thing declamatory. If I had to pick out poems of a kind 
 most perfectly to show Wordsworth's unique power, I 25 
 should rather choose poems such as " Michael " " The 
 Fountain " " The Highland Reaper." And poems with 
 the peculiar and unique beauty which distinguishes 
 these, Wordsworth produced in considerable number; 
 besides very many other poems of which the worth, 30 
 although not so rare as the worth of these, is still 
 exceedingly high. 
 
MA TTHE W ARNOLD. 
 
 179 
 
 On the whole, then, as I said at the beginning, not 
 only is Wordsworth eminent by reason of the goodness 
 of his best work, but he is eminent also by reason of 
 the great body of good work which he has left to us. 
 5 With the ancients I will not compare him. In many 
 respects the ancients are far above us, and yet there is 
 something that we demand which they can never give. 
 Leaving the ancients, let us come to the poets and 
 poetry of Christendom. Dante, Shakespeare, Moliere, 
 
 10 Milton, Goethe, are altogether larger and more splendid 
 luminaries in the poetical heaven than Wordsworth. 
 But I know not where else, among the moderns, we are 
 to find his superiors. 
 
 To disengage the poems which show his power, and 
 
 15 to present them to the English-speaking public and to 
 the world, is the object of this volume. I by no means 
 say that it contains all which in Wordsworth's poems 
 is interesting. Except in the case of " Margaret," a 
 story composed separately from the rest of the " Ex- 
 
 2ocursion," and which belongs to a different part of Eng- 
 land, I have not ventured on detaching portions of 
 poems, or on giving any piece otherwise than as Words- 
 worth himself gave it. But under the conditions im- 
 posed by this reserve, the volume contains, I think, 
 
 25 everything, or nearly everything, which may best serve 
 him with the majority of lovers of poetry, nothing 
 which may disserve him. 
 
 I have spoken lightly of Words worthians ; and if we 
 are to get Wordsworth recognized by the public and 
 
 30 by the world, we must recommend him, not in the 
 spirit of a clique, but in the spirit of disinterested 
 lovers of poetry. But I am a Wordsworthian myself. 
 
l8o WORDSWORTH. 
 
 I can read with pleasure and edification " Peter Bell " 
 and the whole series of "Ecclesiastical Sonnets," and 
 the address to Mr. Wilkinson's spade, and even the 
 " Thanksgiving Ode " everything of Wordsworth, I 
 think, except " Vaudracour and Julia." It is not for 5 
 nothing that one has been brought up in the veneration 
 of a man so truly worthy of homage ; that one has 
 seen him and heard him, lived in his neighborhood, 
 and been familiar with his country. No Wordsworth- 
 ian has a tenderer affection for this pure and sage ic 
 master than I, or is less really offended by his defects. 
 But Wordsworth is something more than the pure and 
 sage master of a small band of devoted followers, and 
 we ought not to rest satisfied until he is seen to be 
 what he is. He is one of the very chief glories of Eng- 15 
 lish Poetry ; and by nothing is England so glorious as 
 by her poetry. Let us lay aside every weight which hin- 
 ders our getting him recognized as this, and let our 
 one study be to bring to pass, as widely as possible 
 and as truly as possible, his own words concerning 2f 
 his poems: "They will co-operate with the benign 
 tendencies in human nature and society, and will, in 
 their degree, be efficacious in making men wiser, 
 better, and happier." 
 
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